


I Prefer Chocolate: A Worm/Vanilla Minecraft SI

by EtchJetty



Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Parahumans Series - Wildbow
Genre: Gen, Prison, Self-Insert
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-31
Updated: 2019-01-01
Packaged: 2019-07-05 04:02:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 25,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15855813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EtchJetty/pseuds/EtchJetty
Summary: A different kind of Worm SI. Late canon.





	1. The Bogeyman Sends Her Regards

**Author's Note:**

> Also available on Spacebattles: https://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/i-prefer-chocolate-a-worm-vanilla-minecraft-si.676363/

I woke up, in spite of the cliche, not in a dirty alleyway of Gotham or New York City, but tied to a chair with a gun pointed at my head.  
  
I blinked a couple times to make sure what I was seeing was real. The owner of the gun wasn't even paying attention to me, instead quickly clacking at a computer with only one hand. The desk the computer was on was messy, covered in several loose papers, a keyboard and mouse, and what seemed to be a normal computer monitor. Her long-sleeved white shirt only served to highlight her lengthy straight black hair. Her focus was entirely taken up by the quickly scrolling text on the screen in front of her.  
  
Or, considering the fedora that sat on top of her head, absolutely none of her focus was on the screen in front of her and I was so incomprehensibly fucked I couldn't afford to waste time trying to come up with clever swear words.  
  
“You are correct,” she responded, without sparing a glance in my direction. Goddammit. What, was she on ‘path to mess with my head’?  
  
“Something along those lines,” she shrugged, with only the hint of a smirk visible on her face. Wait, maybe it wasn't a smirk. Maybe it was something made to make me think that it was a smirk, and lull me into a false sense of—  
  
The smirk grew bigger. Fucking hell.  
  
I took a moment to gather my wits about me, still bleary-eyed from whatever circumstances had landed me in this insane situation. Looking around, the only source of light was the black and white of the text whizzing past on the computer screen. I couldn't see the walls. Hell, I could barely see the floor. Contessa's face was just perfectly obscured by the angle she sat at that I couldn't have described it to a police sketcher if I tried.  
  
If I was even able to try. This whole situation was depressing the hell out of me. Is this really how I met my end, tied to a chair, staring down the gun of a lady who barely even gives enough of a shit about my presence to turn around from the screen for even a moment?  
  
_Fuck it, I'm just gonna risk it._ Seeing a gun inches away from your face kinda scares the shit out of you, but I decided at that moment that opening conversation would be better than hearing only the endless clicking of her one-handed typing.  
  
“So-,” I tried, coughing. I cleared my throat before a second attempt. “What’d… how’d I get here, if it wouldn't kill me to ask?”  
  
Contessa's typing hand stopped for a moment. She only held up a piece of paper from the desk. I squinted to try to make out the words printed on it with the limited light I had.  
  
“Path to finding out what just happened to all of my paths?” I asked aloud. “Wait, does that mean-”  
  
Before I was able to fully formulate my question, Contessa put the paper down and raised another one.  
  
“Path to all of Harold’s secrets,” I read, as she resumed her frantic typing. “Are you being fucking-! My name’s not even Harold! That's just what I use to fill out online petitions! My name is-” and then I paused.  
  
Could she not Path me completely? Why did she name me by my online pseudonym and not my real name? Was this some kind of With This Ring name bullshit? I tried to think of my real name. Nope, still there, as far as I could tell.  
  
Instead of answering any of the multitudes of questions I had, she hit the Enter key on the keyboard with some sense of finality, and swung around on the generic office chair she was sitting in to face me completely, gun still in hand. Why was that necessary? She could kill me in over seven hundred ways, and that's just with her bare hands.  
  
“I wanted to challenge myself a little, now that we've basically got everything we need to win,” stated the cape community's Bogeyman with about as much enthusiasm as someone telling me they saved 27¢ on gas today.  
  
Then the implications of what she said just hit me. “You're not talking about…”  
  
Contessa finally _(finally!)_ put the gun down on the desk. While she did so, she reached for a thick binder that I hadn't noticed sitting behind the monitor. My heart skipped a beat when I saw the title printed on the cover sheet.

 

 

_WORM_  
  
by J.C. McCrae  
  
(as recalled by Harold Jenkins and edited by a Thinker 12+)

Fuck. There it was, in bold print. She had everything I knew. Every scrap of knowledge, every Word of God I'd read late at night. She probably had it all in encyclopedia form right there.

Most importantly, it meant I didn't have bullshit precog immunity, and that any possible leverage I had was totally gone.

Wait. That wasn't totally true. Usually, in these types of stories, the main character is a snarky asshole who bashes the characters they don't like while saving the ones they do with ludicrously overpowered superpowers. I was already a snarky asshole, which ticked one box off the list. But did I have powers?

I tried to feel around my body for an extra limb or something, which was a little hard to do while tied to a chair. I seemed to still be my slightly overweight self, which eliminated Case 53-like physical powers. I didn't feel any smarter, which probably eliminated Thinker powers, I couldn't break out of these ropes, so no Brute powers, thinking really hard didn't give me super speed, so probably no Mover powers, wishing Contessa would just leave me alone eliminated Stranger powers, and staring at the computer didn't make me have _ideas_ , so I probably wasn't a Tinker, either.

Fuck. I didn't even fill out a shady looking email with a link to a CYOA before waking up here, why is this happening to me?

My rising internal angst was interrupted by Contessa clearing her throat, probably at the perfect moment so I would be just as stressed out as she wanted.

“I wanted to give you a second chance, Harold,” she began, placing the binder back on the desk. “The moment you fell down in a random alley in Brockton Bay precogs all over the world had a spasm and began to declare old predictions as incorrect. Your very existence in this multiverse is an out-of-context problem. You're the butterfly who flapped his wings, and Thinkers worldwide are going to be after you.”

“And you're just the first one to find me,” I groaned. In response, Contessa simply smiled.

“By simply existing on Earth Bet for even a moment, you've done more for Cauldron and by extension, the worlds at large, than any other individual human or Parahuman. Since your invaluable information will save billions of lives, possibly trillions, we'd like to offer you sanctuary.”

That threw me for a loop. I looked around at the darkened room, then at the ropes tying me to the chair. I tried not to look at the gun. “Very generous of you.”

“Quite,” she responded, a little too cheerfully for me to believe. “But I wasn't finished.

“If you agree, we’ll provide you a new, legal identity as Harold Jenkins. We thought it might be a good gift. Additionally, we'll provide you with a fully stocked kitchen, completely catered to your whims and dietary restrictions.”

For a moment I wondered how the hell she had a list of my allergies. In response, she held up the same paper from earlier with the words 'Path to all of Harold's secrets.’

My mouth opened and shut for a moment before she continued.

“The room would be designed to your ideal suite, down to the last millimeter, thanks to my power. It would be guaranteed to be the most comfortable room you'd ever stayed in.

“The choice is yours. Enter our sanctuary for you or be hunted by vengeful precogs.”

Well, when you put it that way.

“I didn't have a choice the moment you activated your power, did I?”

“Not in the slightest,” she said, taking a knife out of her belt and cutting open the ropes that tied me to the chair. In one fluid motion, she put the knife away, grabbed the binder labelled _Worm_ and the gun from earlier, and started walking past me. I was rubbing my wrists and stretching some stiff muscles when I noticed her she kept walking into the darkness of the room.

“Wait, hold on!” I sprung out of the chair and tried to run after her, stumbling. For just a moment, there was a flash of brilliant white light in the shape of a rectangle. I covered my eyes to shield myself from the brightness, stopping.

When I opened my eyes, Contessa was gone, and the room was suddenly lit up completely.

It was everything Contessa had promised. Bookshelves lined one side of the wall, filled with books, puzzles, and other games. Another corner housed a kitchen, where I could see a microwave and a fridge, alongside what seemed to be a gas stove. It warranted further exploration after I got my bearings, certainly.

One section of the room had three or so couches facing a TV, with several game systems I did and did not recognize plugged into it. There was a very fancy coffee table in front of the couches, which I thought was a nice touch from the woman who basically kidnapped me.

Almost half of the room was taken up by what I was already mentally calling “the bedroom.” It had a door that seemed to be a closet, a queen-sized bed, and a section marked off with glass walls that I assumed was the bathroom.

Of course, there were no doors or windows, but that was a secondary concern to exploration.

I spun around completely to face where I had come from. The uncomfortable wooden chair I had sat on was still there, alongside the scraps of rope that fastened me to it. But what interested me most was the desk Contessa sat at.

The chair was a generic office swivel chair, nothing too fancy. I walked over to the desk to get a better look at the papers on top. The props Contessa had used for her comedy routine were there, alongside several pieces of paper that were totally blank.

Why had she been typing? The question burned at my mind. What was so important on this computer that she had to type one-handed?

As I sat down in the office chair, I noticed a small button on the bottom of the monitor. I pressed it, and it lit up blue.

The screen flashed a few logos at me before loading up what looked to be the local equivalent of Windows 10. The login screen had more in common with Windows Vista than 10, but it had that flat aesthetic that was all the rage in 2016.

Actually, what year was it, anyway? 2011? It couldn't be past 2013 if what Contessa said was true. I shook my head and returned to examining the computer.

I grabbed the mouse and navigated my way to the user icon labelled “Harold”. No password was set, which was a welcome surprise, considering how much Contessa said she knew about every other tiny detail of my life. The loading screen progressed to reveal…

A normal looking desktop, with the exception of a single program in the center of it. _Minecraft._

…

... _What?_

No, seriously, what? I’m pretty sure that whatever had inspired Notch to start development on the game probably hadn’t existed in this universe. Or any that Scion had touched, really. It’d been thirty-odd years, and if a butterfly could change the script of the Star Wars prequels, it sure as hell probably would mean Minecraft wouldn’t have been made.

Which makes its existence on this desktop all the more curious. I sat in the chair and scooted up to the desk. Why would Contessa have-

Never mind. It’s Contessa. There’s probably a very good and very specific reason, and there’s no point in me pretending to have any agency anymore anyway.

I double-clicked on the grass block icon.

After a brief period where nothing happened but the pointer changing into a little circle with a neat animation, the Minecraft Launcher opened.  
It wasn’t any version of the launcher I was familiar with. There was no news feed, from Mojang or Microsoft. Instead, there was the Minecraft logo, a small settings gear in the corner, and a large green rectangular button labelled “Play.”

Slightly ominous.

I clicked the button, not really knowing what to expect. I was honestly surprised to see the familiar Mojang logo. After a few seconds, it faded, leaving me staring at the classic menu, with options for Singleplayer, Multiplayer, Options, Realms, and Quit.

I didn't really know where to go from here, considering the number of _questions_ the existence of the Realms button raised, so following my muscle memory, I clicked Singleplayer, and opened a new world.

Once I was actually in a world, the game was not very different from what I was used to. I quickly punched an oak tree, killed a sheep, and found a place that looked like a good spot to start a house, before I couldn't handle my curiosity anymore and quit out of the world.

I stared at the main menu _. What hell were Realms and Multiplayer doing here?_ My guess, when I saw Contessa leave through the Doormaker portal, was that I was in some kind of off-world Cauldron facility. Hidden away until they needed some scrap of relevant Word of God Contessa forgot to write down (if such a thing were possible), and then I'd be locked up again. I wouldn't have internet, that's for sure.

But that raised the question: why the hell did Contessa not only leave me a copy of one of my most-played games of all time but one with _multiplayer?_

Did that imply I'd meet _other people_?

On a whim, head still whirling from the potential implications, I clicked on Realms. I got the standard notification that Realms was not enabled and that I had to pay Mojang a monthly fee for access. In the meantime, I couldn't actually access the Realms page, so I closed back out of it.

Finally, I clicked on Multiplayer. Surprisingly, a server was already listed.

The server had the default description, title, and icon. I selected the server and clicked edit to check the server’s address in case that was plot-significant, but it just looked like a regular IP address to my unprofessional eyes.

I sighed. No other way to go about it. I double-clicked on the server’s listing. The loading screen was exactly what I expected, “connecting to the server,” “logging in,” and “joining world.”

What I didn’t expect was what I saw when the world popped into view.

It was a city. No, not one of those amazingly detailed Minecraft cities you always see on the front page of Reddit. It reminded me more of The Division in its realism. Actually, it also reminded me of Assassin’s Creed because of the bird’s-eye view I had. It was sort of odd, however, how the city seemed to be getting larger the more I looked at the screen _OH NO I’M FALLING -_

 _Splash._ My avatar landed in the bay in front of the city. Luckily, it seemed Minecraft’s fall damage physics still applied to this realistic environment. I held down the spacebar as I waited for my character to re-emerge from the depths, noting as I did so that my Hotbar was filled with the same items I had collected in the singleplayer world. A quick press of the ‘E’ key confirmed the rest of my items were present too. That could be potentially useful.

Luckily, I emerged with an air bubble remaining. As I continued holding the spacebar as well as forward, I used the mouse to look around. The city itself was nothing too remarkable. No landmarks that I could recognize were present, although I was swimming towards a beach. When I peered closer, some buildings looked fairly damaged, but I didn’t know what it meant.

Once I got close enough to the beach that my character stopped swimming (a depth of less than a meter was my estimation, thanks Minecraft physics), I decided to turn around to look out over the ocean.

I’d like to say that I understood how fucked I was when Contessa had a literal gun to my head. I’d like to say that I understood how fucked I was when she held up her copy of _Worm_.

Only when I saw the half-destroyed Protectorate Rig did I truly understand what the fuck I was in for.

My _Minecraft avatar_ was in Brockton Bay. _Post-Leviathan_.

This was going to be a long fuckin’ ride from start to finish, I could tell that already.

  
\-----------------------------------------------------------------  
  
[CURRENT INVENTORY](https://i.imgur.com/s64BAv0.png)


	2. Meeting the Locals

In the real world, I groaned. I moved my hands from the keyboard and rubbed my eyes.  
  
"Jesus Christ," I muttered. "The hell am I supposed to do about this?"  
  
I was suddenly reminded of a conversation I had with a bible teacher in the seventh grade. I had seen something online along the lines of “could God microwave a Hot Pocket to be so hot even He couldn’t eat it?” Since I was (and still am) an insufferable smartass, I asked my teacher this question, as she had recently reminded us that God is omnipotent. After looking at me funny for a moment, she said He absolutely could make such a Hot Pocket. I then followed up by asking, since He can do anything, could He eat that impossibly hot Hot Pocket, which _by definition_ He could not eat? She simply responded that God can do anything. Completely befuddled, I asked how such a thing was possible. She responded by telling me that every single one of God’s actions is for a reason. Whether it’s to test His people, or to show His power, God’s actions all have something that can be learned from them. She couldn’t tell me what the lesson from the Hot Pocket was, but she knew that there was one, if God would have done such a thing.  
  
Unrelated, but I now tend to identify as atheist.  
  
My dilemma was that I now had to apply this lesson to Contessa. If Scion’s the closest thing to God in terms of the raw power that could be used to create or destroy the world, Contessa’s this world’s closest thing to God in terms of omnipresence. She can be anywhere, anytime, and everything she does is in service of _a_ specific goal. That’s literally how her power works. I needed to understand her goal in... giving me a nice gaming PC? Programming Minecraft from the source code? Allowing me to have a window to the outside world that could lead to my potential rescue from my luxury extradimensional bunker? If she had everything she needed to beat Scion, why was I even still alive?  
  
It was simply incomprehensible, like the Hot Pocket paradox, but there had to have been a reason.  
  
I sighed again. No point in wasting time having a crisis of faith. I refocused on the screen. Time for some obligatory power testing. Using the magical power of 'holding down the left mouse button,' I began destroying a random cubic meter of sand. The sound effect was the same as destroying sand in Minecraft, but oddly, the pixelated cracks formed slightly above the sand I was punching. After a second or two, a square of sand disappeared, and a smaller version of it floated above the place where the sand was just moments before. I walked over to it, and the item flew into my inventory. Clicking 'E’, I moused over it.  
  
The block was labelled “brocktonBay.block.0.0.0. Not the “Sand” that I was expecting. To test the theory I was developing in my head, I broke the block below it, and picked it up. The new block didn't stack with the old one, and was labelled “brocktonBay.block.0.-1.0”.  
  
So it seemed that I could only break blocks on a grid system. The block I just broke was the origin point, which was convenient, and 0 on the Y axis was roughly sea level. A quick push of F3 confirmed this. That also explained why only a portion of the sand went into my inventory - only a portion was aligned to the grid.  
  
This had the potential to make things very, very inconvenient. Not the least bit because they didn't stack. I put the sand blocks back the way they were, but since sand is just a bunch of particles, bits of sand had already fallen into the cubic gap I had dug. When I placed the blocks back, the displaced sand was forced to the top, leaving an interesting pattern, with a square slightly raised over a small divot all around.  
  
Oh well. It wasn't like the waves weren't going to wash it away soon enough anyway. This was the real world. The only being who followed Minecraft physics here was me.  
  
Speaking of other beings, I looked around the beach. Very few people had smartphones out, pointed at my avatar. Most people just ignored me. Christ, these guys were more jaded than New Yorkers when it came to celebrities. If I saw a two-meter tall pixelated monstrosity swinging his arm in the general direction of sand, I'd be the least bit curious. Or maybe I wouldn't. I didn't live in a world with real superheroes for the past 30 years, after all. Maybe such a reaction was expected?  
  
Or maybe they expected someone else to take care of it, I realized as I saw a giant stuffed bear amble towards me. I had spent so much time working out how blocks worked that I forgot about the fact that I'd attract attention. Off the back of the bear slid a woman in a Victorian-style dress with a doll mask. _Parian._  
  
She walked closer to me. I held down the shift key and looked down to symbolize submission.  
  
“Hello,” she greeted. “We aren't going to hurt you.”  
  
We?  
  
I looked up and uncrouched. Parian seemed to stumble for a bit when she saw how I instantly became taller than her, but regained her composure. Probably because Foil was right behind her, aiming her arbalest at me.  
  
_Foil._ That placed me somewhere specific in the timeline, did it not? I suddenly wished Contessa had left me a copy of _Worm_ for reference.  
  
As I tried to remember, Parian continued in a gentle voice. “Our intelligence saw you fall from the sky, and we thought you might need some guidance. Do you remember your name?”  
  
Remember? Why would I... Ah. They thought I was a Case 53. I certainly looked non-standard enough.  
  
Out of force of habit, I hit 'T’ and typed a response, hitting enter when I was done.

> <hjtfir> Yeah, I do. Why?

After we stared blankly at each other for another moment I realized that real life wasn't an MMO and I slowly moved the mouse up and down.  
  
“Yes?” asked Parian. I moved it up and down again, faster this time. Hopefully she got the message.  
  
“Good. Okay. Can you talk?”  
  
I typed my response.

> <hjtfir> Can you?

Parian made eye contact with Foil. “I don’t think he can talk,” she whispered.  
  
“I noticed,” whispered Foil in response.  
  
Just then, the area we stood in started to look... smudgier, for lack of a better term. The length of the beach was suddenly about half of what I remembered it being.  
  
“Shit, Vista. We gotta run,” said Foil, throwing herself back onto the giant teddy bear’s saddle. She pulled Parian up its back with a fluid grace I thought only Contessa was capable of. Thinker powers must _rock_.  
  
“You’ll be okay, I think. The heroes are coming. Do you know who they are?” asked Parian.  
  
I ‘nodded’ again.  
  
“Good. Remember, if they give you a hard time, the Undersiders are always looking for new partners!” The pair galloped away. As the boardwalk stopped looking like a piece of saltwater taffy, a girl in a green dress stepped up to me, followed by an older man in red clothing.  
  
“Are you going to fight us?” he asked.  
  
I wished I had a sword. That way I could do the classic “right click quickly to represent non-hostility” move people did on servers. In the meantime, I simply moved my mouse left and right.  
  
“Okay. Good. That’s a good start,” said Assault. Vista stood stoically next to him. “Can you talk?”  
  
I refrained from snarkily typing into a chat only I could see. It would only confuse them to see my avatar frozen while I typed. I moved my mouse side to side.  
  
Vista tapped Assault on the shoulder. “Can I take the lead?” she asked quietly. He looked at her, then me, and nodded.  
  
“Alright. Um. Are you new to the area?” asked Vista. Assault cringed. Seems this wasn’t quite the script in the Wards training manual. In the effort of politeness, I ‘nodded’.  
  
“Do you have memories of what happened to you before you fell from the sky?” I nodded again.  
  
“Okay. Um. Didn’t expect that. Uh, do you have any tattoos? Specifically ones shaped like the Greek letter omega?”  
  
I was expecting this question. I opened settings, selected skin customization, and disabled the external layer of my skin. Back when 1.8 first came out, when skins became dynamic, I hopped on the hype train by updating the skin I’d had since I was seven to be 1.8 compatible. That is to say, I moved all of my clothing to an external layer, gave myself bushier hair, and made the underside of my skin to simply be the default Steve in underwear. This was what Vista and Assault saw now.  
  
“Okay, I think we’ve seen enough,” shouted Assault as soon as I disabled my left pants leg. I quickly re-enabled everything and hit escape until I returned to the regular in-game screen.  
  
“Do you want to come with us to the PHQ? We can go over your options for the future. We can get you paperwork, an ID, and all that. You can also get some professionals to help you out with your power.”  
  
I nodded. Contessa said she'd give me an ID as Harold Jenkins, but I didn't see it in my inventory. I assume she'll provide it to me there somehow.  
  
“Okay, we can just wait here until the PRT truck arrives to bring us,” said Vista, looking at Assault. He nodded.  
  
I couldn't cock my head sideways to signify that I intended to ask about the truck like I wanted to, so instead I just jumped. Three feet in the air. Minecraft physics, man. Vista was startled.  
  
“Woah! Okay, um. Are you excited to go the PHQ?” asked Vista. I shook my head.  
  
“So you're... not excited to go to the PHQ?” I shook my head, more vehemently this time. I think I might have accidentally done that thing where my Minecraft avatar’s head clips through his shoulders a bit, because when I stopped shaking the mouse, Vista looked a little sick.  
  
“Okay, can you do me a favor and never do that again? That looked... incredibly painful, and it hurt to watch.”  
  
I shook my head.  
  
Assault frowned. “It wasn't painful?”  
  
I nodded. I don't think anything can actually hurt me through this screen. Take that, internet.  
  
“Hm. What is your power, exactly?”  
  
I went back over to (0, 0, 0) and repeated my destruction of the block. The tiny bit of sand hovered for a moment before being absorbed into my inventory, and I placed it back where I took it.  
  
Assault walked up close to the site of my little experiment. “So, a short-range... telekinetic shaker power? Can you only destroy and put things back?”  
  
I shook my head. Time to show off the second half of the title of _Minecraft_.  
  
I hit 'E’, and placed 5 blocks of oak logs I had acquired from the single player survival world into the crafting square, retrieving 20 oak planks. I purposefully left one log alone for the sake of demonstration.  
  
On a whim, I also created a crafting bench.  
  
I placed the oak log and its byproducts into my hotbar. First, I placed the log down. Because of the grid system it actually ended up hovering slightly above the beach. Assault (but especially Vista) looked startled. I gestured to it by way of left clicking. The pair glanced at each other, but back at me.  
  
“Go on,” said Assault.  
  
I then placed four oak planks next to the floating log. I left clicked on the log once, then the planks. Then I looked at Assault and Vista.  
  
“I... don't get it,” she said sheepishly.  
  
I sighed. What was I going to have to do, make a banner explaining how it worked?  
  
That was when it hit me. I couldn't believe it had taken me as long as it had to remember. Not a banner, I was saving the wool for a bed. But a wooden sign?  
  
That I could do.  
  
I placed down the crafting bench. Right-clicking on it, I quickly placed two oak planks on top of each other. Once I removed the stick from the output slot, I filled the top two thirds of the crafting square with planks and the bottom middle with a stick.  
  
Finally. I had a communication medium. I took the three signs out of the crafting table and put them in my hotbar.  
  
Vista and Assault were conversing quietly as I crafted. I supposed that to them, I looked like I was frozen, staring at the pixelated cube hovering in the air. Once I turned around, Assault gave a little start. Not who I would have expected it from, but I ignored it. I placed the sign on the side of the hovering oak log and began to type out my message.  


> I can't believe it  
> took me this long  
> to remember that  
> signs are a thing.

  
I quickly placed another sign next to it.  


> I should be able  
> to talk a lot  
> easier in the  
> future.

  
I placed another sign next to it.  
  
It took me a minute to think of what to write on the next sign. Should I be upfront? Play coy about my powers? Lie about my memories, pretend to be a Case 53?  
  
Actually... when in the timeline was it? I had guessed that it was post-Leviathan after seeing the state of the city and PHQ. No harm in asking, I guessed.  


> Actually, if you  
> don’t mind me  
> asking, what is  
> the date? Year?

  
“July 19th, 2011,” said Vista.  
  
That was... post-Weaver reveal, I was pretty sure. Weaver was, like, mid-July, Behemoth was sometime late July... shit, I missed the S9, Echidna, _and_ Leviathan? What the hell?  
  
Shit. I needed to take stock of the situation. Okay. So.  
  
The usual checklist for a Worm SI was to find Taylor and cheer her up, try and tell Amy Dallon not to kill herself/brainwash her sister/release a world-ending plague, find and free Tattletale, form an independent team with said SI’s favorite woobies, and save the world... somehow. Also, gratuitous Coil-killing and Jack-slashing was generally good like-fodder.  
  
Only... Taylor was in prison, and pretty far down the slippery slope already. Alexandria could attest to _that_ , yaknowwhatI’msayin’ I’ll stop talking. Amy was presumably Birdcaged and figuring out how powers worked. Coil was already dead and Tattletale basically ran Brockton Bay at this point. Jack Slash was in stasis for the next two years.  
  
If the timeline didn’t change significantly due to my existence, I had about a week before Behemoth.  
  
Oh _god._ I had a week until Behemoth. Okay. How do I secure my position until then? At least secure it enough to push the Minecraft physics engine to its breaking point?  
  
Should I lie to Assault and Vista?  
  
No. There was no point in not telling the truth. If I didn't forge my own path forward, Contessa would forge my Path for me. P-probably.  


> So you heard the  
> speech by  
> Ignus Faustus?  
> @echidna fight?

  
Character limits were a pain in the ass to work around.  
  
Assault looked at Vista. She shook her head, then froze, as if remembering, before nodding reluctantly.  
  
“Did you mean Ignis Fatuus?” she asked.  
  
I destroyed the first sign, and added a new one.  


> Yeah, that’s the  
> one. So you know  
> about Cauldron?

Assault cracked his knuckles. “Do you work for them?”  
  
I destroyed the newest sign and replaced it immediately.  


> No! No. I was  
> kidnapped by  
> their enforcer.  
> It’s complicated.

  
Vista looked at Assault. Assault looked at me. I swung my mouse to face Vista, then Assault. Then I noticed the PRT truck coming to a slow stop near us, and swung my mouse to face that. The duo of heroes heard the sirens and followed my gaze.  
  
I removed and replaced one last sign for good measure.  


> I’ll go to the PHQ  
> with you and  
> answer your Qs.  
> Peacefully.

  
Assault nodded. Vista shortened the distance between us and the truck, and after I destroyed my small wooden construct (to the watchful eye of the, like, thirty PRT officers that filed out the back of the truck) I hopped into the back.  
  
I hoped the coming meeting with Piggot would go well.  
  
...shit, was Piggot even still alive at this point?  
  
I was so fucked.  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
[CURRENT INVENTORY](https://i.imgur.com/Wzwaazs.png)  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: It's a GRID SYSTEM, motherfucker! https://bit.ly/2wLFZEF
> 
> Yes, I am doing this. I am doing it to scale, dammit. Check out my notes: https://bit.ly/2PyP3U8
> 
> Also, for every one of my typed signs, there's a sign in a Minecraft world for reference. When I say vanilla Minecraft, I mean vanilla Minecraft. We're doing it down to the decimal point here, folks. https://bit.ly/2wHqk8x


	3. Feeed Meee

Vista was waiting for me when I got out of Miss Militia's office.  
  
“How did it go?” she asked.  
  
“Pretty good,” I said as we walked towards the power testing facilities. “It was a little hard to explain my situation, but I think I got the basic points across. I'm in a Cauldron base in an alternate Earth, I'm trapped, I was captured for my unique knowledge that they now have access to, I can only access Brockton Bay through what looks like a video game from my home Earth, my avatar follows the game's logic, I'd be down for power testing, and I go by Harold. Couldn’t exactly figure out a way to bring up Behemoth, but I've got time. Most importantly, though, the PRT understands I'm not hostile.”  
  
Vista looked at me for another second before flicking herself in the forehead. “Right, forgot you can't talk. Just nod if it went well.”  
  
I put my elbows on the desk and massaged my face, groaning exceptionally dramatically. Not for the first time that evening did I wish Notch had thought to add voice chat.  
  
I finally managed to move the mouse back and forth, but not before literally head-desking. And also making a vow to never head-desk again, because _ouch_.  
  
“That's good to hear,” Vista responded. “Always nice to have new heroes in the city.”  
  
Woah, missy. Don't think I'm joining the Protectorate just yet. I'm mostly doing power testing to satisfy my own curiosities. Plus, I have no idea if I'm even of legal age, what with the whole backwards time travel thing.  
  
Heh. I said “woah missy” but that's actually her name. I’m a fucking comedic genius.  
  
Of course, Vista got none of this, and we kept walking in relative silence.  
  
We arrived in the power testing room, where Clockblocker was schmoozing with some lab techs. He noticed our arrival and held out his arms lovingly.  
  
“Ah, Vista, new guy, so good to see yo- huh?” He wrapped Vista in a hug with one arm, but the other went right through me. “That was... not the sensation I expected.”  
  
I again wished I could cock my head. What _did_ it feel like? Instead I crouched and looked up at him, hopefully in a questioning manner.  
  
“Why are you looking at me like that? What, do you want a treat or something?” Damn, didn't work. Emoting was hard through a video game character, okay?  
  
Vista was apparently lost in thought. “Let me try,” she said, as she went to stick her arm through my avatar's shoulder.  
  
“Wait!” yelled a tech, scrambling for a clipboard, halting Vista right before she reached me. “Don't do any unauthorized power testing until we get the proper sensor suite set up!”  
  
This was gonna be a long night.  
  
\------------------------------------------------------------------  
  
I had explained the grid system to the techs at least five times. After I explained the “mine” part of Minecraft, they filled a corner of the room with hardened containment foam (still pretty soft) and let me carve out portions of it until all the edges were perfect flat. I now had several pieces of “brocktonBay.block.insert.values.here”, which, infuriatingly, did not stack. I couldn’t rotate them to any position beside the one they were initially in. Despite this, the techs seemed pretty excited.  
  
“Okay, place the block back down.”  
  
I did so.  
  
“Right, we’re going to see if you can pick up stuff that’s not construction materials. Dave?”  
  
A man in a HAZMAT suit entered the testing area. He placed a shiny, new PRT phone on top of the block. Then he turned and left.  
  
“Alright, now pick up the phone.”  
  
I looked at it. Innocuous enough. It was a smartphone that would probably be high-end in 2013, let alone 2011. It seemed Tinkers sped _some_ things up technologically. I held down left-click, and the sound effect was the default for breaking hard things, rather than the “soft/woolen” sound effect I had heard for the containment foam. A cube of pixelated cracks formed, progressing through the animation before it popped.  
  
Unfortunately, the phone didn’t magically turn into a pixelated version of itself. Rather, it just shrank and started floating. I picked it up, and moused over its name.  
  
It was labelled in my inventory as “brocktonBay.block.2486.189.2532”.  
  
What was the point of having everything I picked up being specifically labelled as “block” if it was all going to be blocks?  
  
The techs were all hunched over a screen, so I thought I might take the opportunity to do some inventory rearrangement/basic crafting. I placed down my crafting bench and made a wooden pickaxe and sword. I decided to wait on everything else, since I’d want to at least have stone as the material for my axe, shovel, hoe, and the like. The only pressing needs were for self-defense and self-improvement.  
  
Once my hotbar was rearranged to my liking, I took another look at the cell phone sitting within it. Something tingled in the back of my memory - an experience I’d had with a mod a few years back. I had wanted to use a gun, but rather than firing, the gun kept attaching itself to a wall. Once I stepped outside, however, and right clicked, the gun performed exactly as advertised. All I had had to do was not have any blocks within reach of my avatar.  
  
I ran to the corner of the room, holding the phone in my avatar’s hand. Once no black outline appeared on any of the wall’s blocks, I right-clicked.  
  
I don’t know what I expected, but _nothing_ wasn’t it.  
  
I sighed again. Would I really have to... according to the expectant look of the techs on the other side of the glass, yes.  
  
I placed down a sign.

> In the game,  
>  items could be  
>  activated by  
>  right-clicking.

HAZMAT guy came back in and relayed the content of the sign to the techs.  
  
On the intercom, one of them spoke. “So you were trying to use the phone?”  
  
I nodded.  
  
“Did it work?”  
  
I shook my head.  
  
There was some discussion amongst the techs. Meanwhile, HAZMAT guy swept his arm through the sign and looked at me.  
  
“Why’s it not solid?”

> Game design  
>  thing. Signs were  
>  one of few blocks  
>  that aren’t solid.

  
He shook his head. “That doesn’t answer my question.”  
  
I wished I could shrug my shoulders. He instead took my silence as an answer and sighed.  
  
“Why aren’t you solid?”  
  
I placed down my last sign.

> If 1000 players  
>  were crowded in  
>  a small space, it  
>  got too crazy.

“You could play with other players in the game?”  
  
I nodded, and broke my first sign, about to replace it with an answer to the question, when the intercom techs interrupted.  
  
“Actually, could you leave the portable version of the sign on the ground? Dave, try to pick it up.”  
  
I backed away from the small, floating object. HAZMAT guy, apparently Dave, walked over and stood on it, like I did. When nothing happened, he stuck his hand through it, to no avail. “Nothing.”  
  
That was... incredibly disappointing. There went my fast-track towards uplifting Earth Bet - just give everyone their own lite versions of my powers. I picked up the sign and placed it to answer the question I had been asked earlier.

> You could log in  
>  to multiplayer  
>  servers online.  
>  Actually --->

  
I replaced another sign.

> From my screen  
>  I’m accessing BB  
>  from a server.  
>  Want the IP?

  
I had only added that last bit at a joke, but the techs actually looked genuinely excited. One of them leaned into the microphone and spoke, “We would like that, Harold.”  
  
I nodded, and broke and replaced the last sign.

> I’ll have to log out  
>  and log back in.  
>  I may disappear  
>  for a bit. Is OK?

  
“That’s fine. Take your time,” said the lead tech, the giddy edge not gone from his voice.  
  
I hit ‘ESC’, and, with a hint of trepidation, logged out of Brockton Bay for the first time.  
  
The familiar title screen was both welcome and terrifying. I was reminded all at once all of the craziness from my day. Contessa and her gun, the weird copy of Minecraft, and meeting the Brockton heroes, and power testing.  
  
Not the most stress-free series of events, certainly, but it could have been worse. I could have _actually have been there_ for the second half of it.  
  
My stomach rumbled and I looked to the kitchen. _Tailored to my dietary preferences, huh?_ I would test that.  
  
I walked over to the fridge and opened it. It was filled with small, cubic packages, with a keypad on each. I pulled one out and read the label.  
  
Oh.  
  
Oh my god.  
  
These weren’t snacks, these were _Doormaker portals_. Pre-programmed by Contessa for whatever I was hungry for, and tinker-made to meet all of my exact dietary needs for the period between meals.  
  
Screw whatever I had said about her earlier, Contessa was the _best_. Was this what mealtime at Cauldron was always like?  
  
I went to the nearby table and, following the instructions printed on top, held it up on top of the table’s surface, and pressed the button labelled “Door.”  
  
Directly underneath the device, a square plate on a square placemat with regular utensils fell out of a rectangular portal. The smell hit me immediately. _Lasagna_.  
  
“Thank god it’s the day _after_ Monday,” I joked. Then I remembered that Garfield references weren’t funny anymore and dug in.  
  
\---------------------------------------------------------------  
  
That was the single best goddamn lasagna I had ever had, holy shit.  
  
I can’t exactly describe what went right. Maybe it was just the fact that nothing went wrong. For example, the spinach wasn’t disgusting, soggy nothingness that only distracted from the flavor, but baked to perfection, bringing to mind the forests of ancient Persia, deep with history.  
  
The sauce was the thing of dreams all by itself. It was a glorious dark red, sweet, umami and slightly salty, with just a hint of red pepper to keep the tongue from sinking into complacency. Every tomato in the multiverse would have wished to have the honor to be part of this sauce.  
  
The noodles were just the right consistency to hold the weight of the toppings, yet yielded to my fork without any significant effort. It was a monument to culinary architecture, and I almost felt bad about eating it.  
  
Except I didn’t, because of the cheese.  
  
The cheese. Holy cow, the cheese. I wouldn’t hesitate to place money on the bet that Contessa travelled to at least three different alternate Italys in order to secure the best possible ricotta, mozzarella, and parmesan. And those were just the cheeses I could pick out individually! There were so many smaller, more subtle flavors in the dish that I would have needed to study for years before actually being able to begin to isolate and describe them.  
  
It was, simply put, the best meal I had ever had in my life. And if you think I’m over-analyzing a random section of my day, fuck you. You haven’t had Contessa’s lasagna.  
  
Still not quite full, I ran to the fridge and pulled out another Doormaker Dish, giddy with anticipation.  
  
Out of the portal fell a single breath mint.  
  
I ate it (and enjoyed it), but not before grumbling angrily at thin air.  
  
While sucking on the mint, I walked around the bunker, and sat on a couch. The kitchen’s appliances stood out to me. Why was there a microwave if everything came out of Doormaker’s portals already piping hot? What was the point of the stove if I wasn’t going to be cooking anything?  
  
I shrugged. Maybe they’ll have some plot relevance later. After all, it’s Contessa, Ms. Ruthless Efficiency herself. She wouldn’t put a stovetop simply because it makes the bunker feel more homely, right?  
  
...regardless, this line of thinking wasn’t getting me anywhere. I was doing something important before dinner, but I got distracted and forgot. What was it again?  
  
I looked around the bunker. Kitchen, bedroom, games, books, gaming PC, OH CRAP--  
  
\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
  
When I logged back in, Dave the HAZMAT guy was sitting on the containment foam pyramid, chin leaning on his hands and staring into space. He saw me and jumped up, yelling, “Guys! He’s back!”  
  
I nodded, and broke and replaced a sign I had left.

> Sorry! Dinner  
>  distracted me. I  
>  have the IP  
>  for you all, tho

  
One of the techs muttered close enough to the microphone, “It would have been nice if you would have told _us_ we could take a dinner break...”  
  
Shit. Now I felt bad. What was I supposed to say? I didn’t mean to spend half an hour eating the greatest lasagna in the multiverse?  
  
“Just- please tell us you have your server’s IP address?”  
  
I did, and I replaced a sign with the relevant numbers.  
  
The door opened, and HAZMAT guy saluted. The teenager who walked in wore red and gold power armor, and was holding a rectangular device that looked a little like a Blackberry.  
  
“Hi, I’m Kid Win,” said Kid Win.  
  
I nodded. Hopefully he understood that nod meant that I was _totally geeking out over him oh my GOD, my first Tinker_!  
  
He nodded in return. S̶e̶n̶p̶a̶i̶ ̶n̶o̶t̶i̶c̶e̶d̶ ̶m̶e̶!̶ I said nothing embarrassing in my mind as he walked over.  
  
“This,” he said with a small flourish, “is a modular communicator. It allows for audio communication over long distances, short distances but extremely with high quality audio, text communication worldwide, has a video mode with the built-in camera, and supports input or output from nearly all commercial cameras, microphones, headphones, keyboards, screen types, and speakers.” He looked genuinely proud. I was proud too, dammit! My boy had had his character arc!  
  
He continued. “The new module I just developed was based partially on Professor Haywire’s work. It _should_ allow for interdimensional text-based communication once I input that IP address.”  
  
I kept my mouse steady.  
  
“Now you’re probably wondering why I think that.” I was, actually. “Based on the fact that you claim to be located in another dimension, I think that the IP is _already_ keyed for interdimensional communication.”  
  
That was... extremely promising. Would Kid Win be able to join the server on his Tinkertech Blackberry?  
  
“I’ll be able to test my hypothesis right...”

> KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3 has joined the game.  
>  <KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3> ...now.  
>  <hjtfir> holy shit holy shit can you read this?  
>  <KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3> Yes! Yes I can!  
>  <hjtfir> holy fuck oh my god hoasudhia uwdiaudb aiwd  
>  <KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3> ...Are you okay?  
>  <hjtfir> Soryry! Just excited  
>  <hjtfir> sorry*  
>  <hjtfir> Fuck signs. Seriously. They suck.

“Kid Win, everything okay in there?” buzzed the intercom.  
  
Win looked up from his device and shouted, “Everything’s fine! My communicator module worked!”  
  
“Kid, you filled out the paperwork for that thing, right?”  
  
Kid looked sheepishly at the Blackberry. “Not yet, but, I mean, at least I tested it in the power testing facility?”  
  
The tech on the intercom groaned. “Yeah, fine. Dave, do a ‘Tech analysis on it, but I’m pretty sure this one’ll be harmless. Procedure is procedure, though.”  
  
Kid Win sighed and walked to the containment foam pyramid and handed the phone to Dave, who drilled Kid Win about the new module’s materials (An aluminum alloy I found in Armsmaster’s lab), power supply (It draws power from the phone and also from alternate dimensions a little bit), interactions with the space-time continuum (It won’t break anything! I swear!) before Dave called it safe enough for practical testing.  
  
“Just make sure to fill out the formal approval paperwork before using it outside the Rig, okay? This isn’t the first time.”  
  
Kid Win sighed. “I’m not gonna build another huge laser gun without PRT permission. Learned that the hard way.”  
  
Dave nodded. “That’s good. Alright, I’m going to take a dinner break, and the guys outside are too. Show the new guy around or somethin’.”  
  
“I will,” said Kid Win.

> <KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3> Are you okay with that?  
>  <hjtfir> I’ve got working ears, you know.  
>  <KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3> Sorry.  
>  <hjtfir> On showing me around: I’m actually getting kind of tired. Is there a place I can put my avatar so that nobody will accidentally be standing inside of it when I relog?  
>  <KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3> Oh, yeah. There’s an empty room in the Wards HQ section of the base, I’ll mark it off as occupied.

And so we left the power testing chamber.  
  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------------------  
  
[CURRENT INVENTORY](https://i.imgur.com/4hChNS6.png)  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------------------

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Sorry for the delay! 
> 
> Writing the lasagna part was the hardest section. Not because it was difficult prose, no, but because I wrote it like right before dinner in the real world. Torture.
> 
> Also, I am not an artist. Please forgive my attempts at inventory management.


	4. But This Time, I Explore My PC

New Delhi rumbled under Behemoth’s attack. Great balls of fire flew from his fists, destroying building after building as he raged.  
  
One fireball hit Vista in the back. She screamed.  
  
“Shit!” I yelled, and ran over to her. I threw a splash potion of fire resistance, but it was too late. She already had taken too much damage. I removed her visor and fumbled with a healing potion.  
  
“D-don’t...”  
  
“Vista, it’s going to be okay. Hold on for another second.” I tried to get the cap off the potion. Why wasn’t it opening?  
  
She coughed weakly. “Don’t...”  
  
“Hold on!” I shouted. Dammit, my fingers kept slipping off the top! I just...  
  
Vista stopped shuddering. She looked up and made eye contact.  
  
“Don’t forget about me, okay?” she said, and I looked at her face, but her face didn’t look like Vista’s anymore, it looked like Sam’s, but Sam wasn’t in Worm with me, and she wasn’t Vista, but then I hadn't actually seen Sam since- since-  
  
The girl in my arms froze up, and turned red and rolled over, and evaporated into a few puffs of smoke, and her inventory flew into mine. But that wasn’t how this worked, only I had an inventory, why wasn’t anything making sense anymore?  
  
I looked up and saw the face of Behemoth. He leered over me, his cubic head constantly firing more, smaller variants of itself at the city. I felt the withering effect of his presence, screamed in rage and frustration, and typed out the final command the world would ever see:

> /kill @e

And then I woke up, gasping.  
  
I looked around, trying to ground myself. White walls. This wasn’t my room. But it wasn’t New Delhi, either, and I could breathe.  
  
I clutched my sheets to my chest as I heaved. As I moved my arms, I realized I was _drenched_ in sweat.  
  
“Fuck, I need to change,” I breathed.  
  
A small, rectangular portal opened above the bed, and a pile of folded clothes came out.  
  
Grateful to have anything to think about that wasn’t my dream, I peered at the clothes a little closer. They looked like PRT gift shop merch. Green and white PRT-branded boxers, sweatpants, a Miss Militia T-Shirt, and a PRT sweater. Comfortable.  
  
I put the outfit on. As I struggled with the sweater, I rolled out of bed and tried to take stock of what time it was. I quickly realized I had no idea how to tell. There were no windows, and the lights were set to a dim twilight the moment my feet hit the floor.  
  
I shuffled to the kitchen, noting how the lights slowly brightened so as to not blind me. Rows of Doormaker Dishes greeted me as I opened the fridge, and I grabbed one at random, walking over to the table.  
  
Out of the square portal fell a bowl of dry cereal that looked suspiciously like Rice Chex. I stared at it for a moment in confusion. Right as I was about to press the button again, a portal opened, dropping a tall glass of milk next to the bowl. A quick sip revealed that the milk tasted like 2%, just how I liked it, and I poured some into the bowl.  
  
Never let me say Cauldron’s food service is anything but complete.  
  
Breakfast, especially compared to last night’s dinner, was nothing special. The Chex just tasted like something I’d eat on an average Wednesday morning. Which it was. Wednesday, that is. Before going to bed the previous night, I had found a calendar laying around near the books and games, and Vista’s date of July 19th, 2011 was a Tuesday, which means... well, I’m sure you remember the last sentence I had just finished saying.  
  
Remembering Vista made me glance at the PC. I had played some singleplayer Minecraft after logging out of Brockton, and managed to gather about as many materials as I needed to build a “starter house.” Half a stack of oak logs, a stack of cobble and coal, and a full set of stone tools, alongside a bed and some cooked food. It hadn’t been easy to collect those materials - I had died twice and gotten totally lost after the first death. I was only able to retrace my steps back to my items thanks to the path of saplings that had been left after my first expedition. The Singleplayer world had been set to Normal difficulty, and skeletons were annoying as all hell without a shield. Unfortunately, after an hour of searching, I could not find any iron.  
  
I did, however, manage to tame a dog. I named him “Bolt” after that Disney movie everyone likes to pretend didn’t happen.  
  
Some things were definitely weird about the version of Minecraft Contessa had left me. For starters, the bottoms of lakes, rivers, and oceans were covered in greenery. Smaller fish, not just squid, swam through them and killing them netted me Raw Salmon, an item I had thought to only be available through the fishing rod.  
  
Unfortunately, despite having internet access strong enough to connect me to another dimension, there was no browser that I could find. No files, no start menu. The computer was completely locked down - it didn’t even have a clock - except for allowing me access to Minecraft. Disappointing, for sure, but it wasn’t like the rest of the bunker was empty. Anyway, Minecraft was entertainment enough, at least for a while.  
  
Also, at some point, I had found something called a Stripped Oak Log, which was just such a weird item that I gave it a special place in the chest I had made to house things I didn’t want to bring back to Brockton Bay.  
  
All of that had happened last night. I was now ready to log back into Earth Bet.  
  
I stood up, then flushed as I realized what I had forgotten the whole morning.  
  
...I was ready to log into Earth Bet after I used the bathroom, that is.  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
[CURRENT INVENTORY / LARGE CHEST](https://i.imgur.com/Q1895yS.png)  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
Kid Win, it seemed, had been anxiously awaiting my arrival, because I got a message the moment I logged in.

> <KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3> You’re back!

I smiled and typed out a response.

> <hjtfir> Yup. Had a nice time sleeping but duty calls  
>  <hjtfir> or insert something funnier along those lines

Kid took a moment to respond.

> <KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3> ...right. Well, I spent all night making communicators for everyone. They should be approved some time around noon.  
>  <KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3> I’m also unlocking the door to the room you’re in. Just walk out when you’re ready.  
>  <hjtfir> Is it possible to fix that naming thing before you distribute them?

As I heard the door swing open, I received a response.

> <KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3> Naming thing?  
>  <hjtfir> Your name is basically a ranom jumble of numbers and letters  
>  <hjtfir> random*  
>  <hjtfir> Unless that was intentional?

I began to walk towards the direction I vaguely recalled Kid Win pointing out as the location of the “actual Wards HQ.”

> <KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3> It wasn’t. What do you see?

I had to stop to type out a response. Thanks, Notch, for making it so that you couldn’t move at all while typing.

> <hjtfir> Your name’s listed as KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3 instead of Kid_Win or something like that.

I resumed walking.

> <KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3> ...Odd. On my screen I’m just “me” and you’re also a random bunch of letters.

I stopped again. This was getting a little annoying, and if the expression of the PRT employee who just walked past me was any measure, it looked odd from an outside perspective, too.

> <hjtfir> What letters?  
>  <KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3> “Hjtfir,” whatever that means.

Oh. I understood now.

> <hjtfir> That’s actually my Minecraft username, believe it or not.  
>  <KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3> What? Why?  
>  <hjtfir> Well, the real answer is that when I was making my username for Club Penguin circa 2006, all my usual names were taken, and I just mashed letters on the keyboard and got hjtfir.  
>  <hjtfir> Fake answer is that my name, Harold Jenkins, is the first two letters, t is for “the”, and fir is for first. so I’m Harold Jenkins the First.  
>  <KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3> Why did you come up with a fake answer?  
>  <hjtfir> ...I came up with the fake answer when I was ten, okay?

I decided to start sprint-jumping to make faster time. Now that I had food in my inventory, Hunger wasn’t as precious a resource as it had been before.

> <hjtfir> And besides, even if I don’t use hjtfir as my username *anymore*, it still lives on. My current username for most websites, EtchJetty, started out as EtchJetty4.  
>  <hjtfir> Pronounced like hjtfir! I thought that was so clever when I came up with it like half a decade ago.  
>  <KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3> Well, thank you for your life story, but I’m trying to figure out how to change my username. Was it possible to do it in-game?

I turned a corner. Dead end. I had heard a bit of fanon that PRT buildings were built modularly in order to save time while blueprinting and to confuse criminals that get ahold of the layout. I still wasn’t sure if that was accurate, but it sure felt like I was wandering around a randomly-generated maze.

> <hjtfir> Not in vanilla, no. You’d have to go to the publisher’s website and change it there. On some servers, the command /nick worked, but the server owner needed to use certain plugins.  
>  <KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3> I have an idea.  
>  KyriASFPEhA6UUzlBiD3 has left the game.

Kid Win didn’t log back in for some time. I relented and decided to ask for help, turning around and looking for a PRT employee. When I finally found one, I tried to place a sign down, only to realize I didn’t have any in my inventory. I quickly made one with my crafting bench, to the bewilderment of the employee, and placed it down.

> Do you know  
>  the way to Wards  
>  HQ? I need to  
>  find Kid Win.

After confirming my identity with his superiors, the man was kind enough to direct me all the way to the door and unlock it for me. The famed “masks-on alarm” blared, and the door opened, revealing Kid Win, Vista, and Clockblocker in various levels of “costumed”. Kid Win was wearing mildly stain-covered jeans and a T-shirt and was fiddling with his communicator. Vista wore a similar outfit, but her jeans were clean, and her T-shirt was Vista merch. Clockblocker was actually wearing part of his costume, but only from the waist up - instead of his costume pants, he wore athletic shorts. It covered him just enough so that anyone who video-called him would think he’s fully clothed. A functional outfit for his duty at the console. All wore, at the very least, a domino mask.  
  
I got a new message from Kid Win as I placed a sign down to thank the PRT employee.

> Kid_Win has joined the game.  
>  <Kid_Win> Did it work?

I ran over to him and tried to angle myself to see the screen of his communicator. He yelped, evidently not realizing that I was physically in the room with him. Well, not physically. But you know what I’m saying.

> <hjtfir> Yup! You’re Kid_Win from my perspective.  
>  <Kid_Win> Perfect.

As Kid Win enthusiastically returned to his device, I wandered around the Wards HQ, taking it all in. The dome-shaped room had small personal effects of the Wards strewn about. This common area was probably not the section shown to tourists. A wall of screens where Clockblocker sat listed crimes that had happened or were happening in and around Brockton, but I noticed that some of them were marked with an asterisk.  
  
“Undersiders,” said Vista, “or crimes directly related to them.”  
  
She had noticed me staring at the monitors. I moved closer to get a better look.  
  
“They run this city, even now, without Weaver. Totally untouchable.”  
  
I turned back to look at her. Her mouth was set in a grim line. Wasn’t she still, like, twelve? This was the kind of despair I’d usually associate with people who worked in retail for decades learning that the store they worked at was going to be bought by Walmart.  
  
I looked at Kid for confirmation, but he wasn’t paying attention to us. Instead, I looked at Clockblocker, who had turned his chair around.  
  
“We could technically try to apprehend them, legally,” he began. “They’ve all got warrants for their arrests.”  
  
“But there are only four of us, not including you, and eight of them, but that excludes whatever truces they’ve got worked out with other gangs. Tattletale, Grue, Imp, Hellhound, Barker, Biter, Parian, and...” Vista looked at the floor.  
  
“Foil,” finished Kid Win. He had come to join us while we were talking. “Her name’s Foil.”  
  
Oh, shit.

> <hjtfir> How long ago did she defect?

Kid Win looked at the communicator, then up at my face.  
  
“How do you know that?”  
  
_What?_ Oh, _shit._  
  
It wasn’t common knowledge yet that Flechette had defected. Hell, I wasn’t even supposed to know who Flechette was if I had only arrived in Brockton yesterday.  
  
I needed a moment to think about what I was going to say.

> Remember how I mentioned that I have special knowledge?

I immediately rejected that, because it explained nothing. Plus, I had said that out loud to myself, no-one had heard it. I erased it and started typing again.

> <hjtfir> What do you all know about from my meeting with Miss Militia?

Kid Win frowned at his communicator, then clicked a button. A robotic voice read my message aloud to the group.  
  
“I didn't hear all the details, but I was under the impression you were going to join the Wards. Also that this wasn't your real body, but details on that were sparse,” replied Clockblocker.  
  
Ah, right. He was Wards Leader. He'd have access to that sort of information.

> <hjtfir> Well, basically, to confirm something you've probably wondered in the past, there are more than Earth Bet and Aleph out there. I was originally from another parallel, without Scion or capes.  
>  <hjtfir> Back home, there was someone with an extraordinary ability. Somehow, he had the power to peer into other universes. He went by the username Wildbow online.

The Wards were shocked as they listened to the robotic text-to-speech device explain my circumstances in a monotone. I described how Wildbow used his ability, something I hadn't realized he had while I first read Worm, to write web novels.  
  
“So, wait, to you we were all fictional?” asked Kid Win.

> <hjtfir> For a time, yes.  
>  <hjtfir> I mean, imagine waking up one day in Hogwarts. You'd accept that JK Rowling had some sort of multiversal scrying ability, right?

“...you're just talking out of your ass, aren’t you?” said Vista, tilting her head a little.

> <hjtfir> No  
>  <hjtfir> Well, kinda  
>  <hjtfir> WB never mentioned having that ability but in hindsight I’m pretty sure that it’s the case

“Right,” said Clockblocker, stretching out the sound of the ‘i’. “Say we believe you. Who was the main character of this ‘web novel’?”

> <hjtfir> Think about it. Right now, who’s the most important person on Earth Bet?  
>  <hjtfir> The one who fights the most battles.  
>  <hjtfir> The one who’s been through the most crises.  
>  <hjtfir> The most interesting person to follow for a web novel, for being her is suffering.

Vista piped up. “Originally, I was gonna say Scion, but you just said ‘her’. So my guess is kind of moot.”  
  
“Alright,” said Kid Win, “You’ve got me intrigued. Who’s the main character of our corner of the multiverse?”  
  
Kid Win’s communicator was silent for a moment before the speaker crackled out, in its robotic monotone, the name “Taylor Hebert.”  
  
All the Wards responded at once: “You’ve gotta be kidding!” “Ha, ha, very funny.” “Bullshit!”  
  
Surprisingly, it was Vista who had called BS. We all turned to look at her.  
  
“You heard me,” she defended herself, “bullshit. We’ve all gone through so much. Aegis, Gallant. We were there for Leviathan and the Slaughterhouse Nine. I got fucking _eaten and cloned_ by Echidna. That _murderer_ doesn’t have a fucking monopoly on suffering.”  
  
“Vista, Echidna's classified,” began Clockblocker, but she interrupted.  
  
“He knows about Echidna. It was the first thing he mentioned when Assault and I picked him up on the beach.”  
  
She turned and tried to make eye contact. Never before was I so aware that she was starting at a 16 by 16 square of pixels instead of my face.  
  
“You know what the most fucked up part of this is? I believe you. I believe your crazy,” she took a step forward, “shitty,” she thrust her hand towards my chest, pointing accusingly, “and bleak fucking outlook on my home planet is real. I mean, it’s literally been only two days since Flechette left. Of course, we’d get another Ward to literally drop out of the sky! It’s only good storytelling!”  
  
I didn’t know what to say.  
  
“That’s not even the worst part. The worst part is that you’re not even here. You see us through a fucking screen. No matter what you claim to believe, how can we _not_ be fictional fucking characters if the only method of interaction you have is through a goddamn mouse and keyboard?”  
  
I began to type something out, but I couldn’t - my heart was pounding too loudly, my fingers shaking as they neared the keyboard. Nothing I would have typed would have felt right, regardless.  
  
Through the monitor, I could see the other two Wards stare at Vista as she bent space to get away from us as fast as possible.  
  
We were all silent as she walked away. None of us were too keen on continuing the discussion.  
  
As she rounded a corner, I heard the “masks on” alarm blare once again, and the door opened to let in a costumed individual I didn’t recognize. He had a greyish-blue costume, and his helmet left his jaw exposed. Was this the fourth Ward that they had mentioned?  
  
“Guys,” he said. “I don’t know if you’ve been paying attention, but- oh.” He noticed me standing with Clockblocker and Kid, and interrupted himself. “Sorry. We haven’t met yet. I’m Crucible, I’m deputy Wards Leader.”  
  
Crucible walked over to me and extended a hand, which I just stared at.  
  
“Crucible,” said Kid. “He’s a video game avatar. There’s no button on his end for handshake.” Crucible sheepishly put extended hand behind his head. Oof.  
  
We all shuffled awkwardly for a moment, me leaning back in my chair and Kid and Clockblocker sort of reaching for their arms in some sort of solidarity. None of us wanted to bring up the small, green elephant that was no longer in the room.  
  
Suddenly Crucible startled. “Oh! Yeah, I wanted to tell you, Win, that the new comms are approved, at least for the Wards.”  
  
Kid Win and I both whooped. Well, he shouted something that expressed excitement. I whooped. Nobody could hear me, but it felt good to do it.  
  
“Here,” said Crucible as he heaved a box from the hallway into the room. ”Open.”  
  
Kid Win took out what I could only assume to be a Swiss Army Knife on steroids. He flicked a switch, and a box cutter popped out. Opening the box, he took four nearly-identical communicators out of their packaging.  
  
“I’ll have to configure them to our names, but they should already be set to the IP,” explained Kid, as he turned them on. I got notifications in the chat as he did so:

> y6k4sZSHtg6Xkx2y8HEZ has joined the game.  
>  LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj has joined the game.  
>  lD32UXvkPQJ2YTU1Q0GS has joined the game.  
>  kERTDYtZeVrfqFUbKSwL has joined the game.

I looked at the communicators. There were four, plus Kid Win’s original, and that made five, right? Was there an extra?

> <hjtfir> Hey, Kid, can I have the extra communicator?

All of the communicators spoke up at once, each with the slightest delay, which meant all four of us standing in the main room had to hear the devices clamoring over each other. Kid Win grimaced as he disabled text-to-speech output on all but one of the comms.  
  
I sent the message again. This time none of us were forced to physically cringe.  
  
“Sure, I guess, but what would you even want it for?” asked Kid, as he fiddled with the volume settings.

> <hjtfir> I want to explore Brockton Bay. I barely had a chance to do that before Vista and Assault picked me up. If I keep the comm in my inventory, I can give it to people so that I can talk to them.

Kid Win seemed to think on this for a second, then looked at Clockblocker.  
  
“Are you an official Ward yet, Harold?” asked Clockblocker. “Because they were cleared for use for _Wards_. I haven’t heard of you putting pen to paper.”  
  
I grimaced, and typed out a response.

> <hjtfir> One of the requirements if I join is that I need a handler for at least the first few days of being a Ward. Since I’m technically a Case 53 with a disability, especially.  
>  <hjtfir> I don’t want that for exploration. It’ll feel limiting.

Clock nodded. “I understand. Kid, you have my written permission to give a comm to Harold. Or whatever your cape name’s going to be. Harold doesn’t sound too heroic, but I’m one to talk.”

> <hjtfir> Call me... *Steve*.  
>  <hjtfir> That’s much funnier to me than it is to you.

“I’ll bet,” said Kid Win. He tossed me a communicator. I swung my pickaxe at it in midair, and it turned tiny, floating on the ground for a moment before being added to my inventory. Kid smiled and turned around.  
  
As he walked to get something for Clockblocker to sign, Kid Win asked me a question. “I know I probably shouldn’t pry, but do you have a location in mind?”

> <hjtfir> I do, actually. But I’m not sure where it is.

“Oh really? Maybe I can help.”

> <hjtfir> You can? Great! How do I get in contact with Faultline’s Crew?

\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
[CURRENT INVENTORY](https://i.imgur.com/EJbzcF4.png)  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: For those non-Minecraft nerds reading this story, the command "/kill @e" targets all entities in the world and kills them. In the context of the dream, this kills all Entities, including the Endbringers and Scion, but also all powered individuals, which is why he woke up.
> 
> I am sincerely sorry for the delay. Recently I've been far busier than I was before. In addition, I was seriously having trouble with this chapter, because more than anything I didn't want this fic to lavish in the same few plot points it's been stuck in: Power testing, the usual SI shenanigans, and simple introductions. The plot has to begin to go somewhere, and I think I began to head in the right direction with this chapter.
> 
>  
> 
> However, I do want to ask for feedback more than anything. Especially with the dream sequence at the beginning of this chapter, we are officially moving out of what could still be considered as "prologue." Now, Harold's real quest begins.
> 
>  
> 
> Oh, and two final mechanics notes:
> 
> All of the discussion of singleplayer Minecraft that happens in-story is of a real Minecraft playthrough I do before I write this story. Real-world items that take up slots in my inventory are blocked out for me by my use of Barriers. Thus, all inventory counts are (to the best of my knowledge) story and video-game-mechanically-accurate.
> 
> Also, does the image of the Game Boy Advance in the inventory (representing the communicator) look weird, or is it just me? I dunno. I'm not an artist.
> 
> Thank you so much for being patient.


	5. Snails and Gardens

I stood outside the door to the Palanquin, wondering how exactly I’d approach this. If I was there in person, I’d have been able to knock or something. Make noise. But my avatar wasn’t exactly capable of anything that wasn’t destroying and placing 1 cubic meter of material. I temporarily resigned myself to wait.  
  
After fifteen minutes and nobody entering or leaving the Palanquin (but plenty of gawkers staring at my avatar), I gave up on subtlety, and whipped out my Stone Pickaxe.  
  
Breaking and entering was much easier than I thought it’d have been. I just walked into the neighboring alleyway and carved a path inside. The concrete of a part of the Palanquin’s side walls turned into tiny floating cubes in no time at all. Picking them up, I walked onto the empty dance floor.  
  
It was totally abandoned. None of the lights were on in the building, and the bar area looked like a tornado had hit it.  
  
Which, I realized with growing dread, it basically had.  
  
_Shatterbird_. Her city-wide song had totally wrecked the internals of the club. Hanging flatscreen TVs that would have displayed song lyrics or ads were just empty hulls, all of the glass from within strewn about the floor. The floor itself was in pieces, the LED panels that made it up utterly non-functional.  
  
As I looked around the darkened room, I realized walls had scorch marks up and down. I remembered now. Burnscar had come here to talk to Elle, but she was on a walk at the time, so Burnscar burnt down the Palanquin.  
  
How did I forget that?  
  
I navigated my avatar around to the entrance to the loft area, where Faultline would have been staying. The stairs were gone, having essentially exploded (they were built with fancy glass material that let stair-users look below them). It didn’t really matter, though, since the loft was worse off. Half of the balcony had collapsed onto the floor below it.  
  
I didn’t expect this. When Kid Win didn’t want to help me find Faultline, I just asked for the Palanquin’s address, which he gave with only a raised eyebrow. Was this why they had left the Bay?  
  
I exited the club the way I came in, ensuring to plug the hole in the wall I had made. Once I finished, I turned around, and was surprised to see a large man in a trench coat watching my repairs. I couldn’t make out his face underneath the hat he wore.  
  
“Are you fixing the wall?” he asked. His accent was thick and Scandinavian. It reminded me of Iceland.  
  
I moved my mouse up and down.  
  
The man seemed a little surprised to see me nodding. “Yes? Good.” He looked at the wall again, walking up closer to see the seam in the repairs. There was none.  
  
He turned around to look at me. “Did you break the wall?”  
  
I ‘nodded’ again, slower this time.  
  
He laughed, fully and heartily. Even through the computer’s speakers I could tell it was a real laugh. I smiled, despite myself.  
  
“Well, so long as you fix it, that is the important part,” he smiled, and turned around to feel where I had broken the blocks.  
  
I could hear him sigh. “I didn’t always care much for the parties here,” he began. “But it was more to me than just a nightclub.”  
  
Something was familiar about this guy. Very familiar.  
  
“That’s not to be worried about now, though. What’s your name?” He turned around to face me. In the new angle, I could see under the brim of his hat. Gregor the Snail’s face was covered in ugly sores, or barnacles, or something. In my chair, I recoiled. Luckily my avatar was able to stay perfectly still.  
  
I moved my mouse back and forth. Gregor frowned. “You cannot speak?”  
  
I ‘nodded’, then quickly ‘shook my head’. Opening my inventory, I moved the communicator to my hotbar and placed it into the real world. It clattered to the ground. Carefully, Gregor bent down and picked it up. He turned it around and looked at the back, then at the screen, that at me.  
  
“What is this?” he asked.

> <hjtfir> It’s a communicator. I have very specific circumstances, but this allows he to talk.  
> <hjtfir> me*

Gregor squinted at the screen as he read my message. He wasn’t a particularly fast reader. Then I remembered he was non-native (to America or Earth Bet) and I felt bad for thinking that.  
  
“So then you are able to tell me your name, no?” he asked.

> <hjtfir> Call me Steve, I guess. Bland enough name.  
> <hjtfir> It’s not actually mine.

“Steve,” said Gregor. He said the name as if he was testing out the sound of it, feeling his tongue as he said it. “I have a question for you, Steve. Why are you exploring a burned-out nightclub?”  
  
No point in being dishonest.

> <hjtfir> I was looking for you, actually.  
> <hjtfir> or any other member of Faultline’s Crew  
> <hjtfir> you ARE Gregor, right?

“Yes,” he responded. “I thought it would be like that. We have not been located here in some time.”  
  
_About 9 or so Arcs_ , I didn’t say. That would have been stupid.  
  
“I was coming back to check on the property. It is lucky that you were here when I was. You would not find anything in there but lost time,” said Gregor.

> <hjtfir> I didn’t realize. I’m new in town.

Gregor looked at the communicator in his hands, then at the PRT ENE logo stamped into the back. “And yet I have discovered that that is not eminently true. Tell me some other things about yourself, Steve."

> <hjtfir> I’m joining the Wards.  
> <hjtfir> I havent signed anything yet  
> <hjtfir> because I wanted to meet with Faultline first  
> <hjtfir> there’s something very important I need to tell her about C

Gregor frowned. He looked up and down the alley. Satisfied that there didn’t seem to be any listeners, he leaned in close and whispered in my avatar’s ear.  
  
“What do you know that we did not learn from Ignis Fatuus?”  
  
I quickly typed out a response. Being as close to Gregor as I was probably wasn’t a good idea considering his powerset.

> <hjtfir> They’re holding people. My real body included.  
> <hjtfir> what you’re looking at is a projection. I’m actually in a base of theirs being held against my will.  
> <hjtfir> many other c53s are there including Doormaker and the Clairvoyant, their two-cape portal network

Gregor looked down at the communicator. “Do you have any proof for these claims?”

> <hjtfir> not at the moment

“Do you have any reason for Faultline’s Crew to investigate?”

> <hjtfir> This is intel on Cauldron you literally cannot get anywhere else.

Gregor looked at me. “A better reason,” he said. “We have had many people claim the same thing with more proof than you have.”

> <hjtfir> If you mean money  
> <hjtfir> I currently have none  
> <hjtfir> but I can write you a hell of an IOU

Gregor shook his head and held the communicator back out to me. “I am sorry, but I do not think there is anything we can do for you. If you are trapped in their base as you say, there is no reason to assume such an assault will not already have been anticipated.”  
  
I groaned. Goddamnit, can’t you just take me at my word?

> <hjtfir> Can you at least pass the message on to Faultline?

Gregor looked in my eyes, then sized my avatar up and down. “I will not be bringing this communication device with me. But I will pass on a message.”

> <hjtfir> That’s all I ask.  
> <hjtfir> also if you’re not going to keep the comm please throw it up in the air, there’s a weird quirk of my power that means i can’t carry things that are within 1 meter of anything else  
> <hjtfir> thank you in advance.

Gregor did so, and we parted ways. I wasn’t happy with that outcome. Not at happy all.  
  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
  
As I began the trek back to the PRT HQ, the chat re-opened itself.

> <Kid_Win> Steve?  
> <hjtfir> Whaddup  
> <Kid_Win> Where are you?  
> <hjtfir> done exploring for now, heading back. Why?

I continued walking as Kid presumably typed out a response.

> <Kid_Win> We just got a call. Members of a group called Lost Garden have been spotted, and some people think they’re gearing up for a fight.  
> <hjtfir> Who?  
> <Kid_Win> Lost Garden. Led by Barrow? They’re from NYC.  
> <hjtfir> nvm, I know who you’re talking about

I had literally no idea what Kid Win was talking about.

> <hjtfir> Which members are there?  
> <Kid_Win> Unconfirmed. Lost Garden capes all wear the same green forest costume. From the body types we have a few guesses, but nothing conclusive.

I didn’t remember this group at all. But I had to help, right?

> <hjtfir> How can I help?

There was a longer pause than before.

> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> You can’t. You’re not a Ward yet. It would be illegal for us to ask you for help before you signed anything. --Clockblocker  
> <hjtfir> That really sucks.  
> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> Sorry. But we can’t risk you getting hurt before we really understand what you can take.

Wait. This was for my protection?

> <hjtfir> I am 99% sure this avatar can die  
> <hjtfir> It’s not tied to my real body  
> <Kid_Win> ...Are you sure?  
> <hjtfir> Actually fuck it let’s test it

I began to sprint-jump towards the closest body of water I saw.

> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> Steve, I really don’t think that’s a good idea.  
> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> I can’t believe I have to tell you this but do NOT MAKE A SUICIDE ATTEMPT TO SEE IF YOU CAN COME BACK  
> <hjtfir> My powers are instinctually telling me I can come back when I die  
> <Kid_Win> This is a very bad idea. Very very bad idea.

You’re not my mom, Kid.  
  
A solid minute or two of sprint-jumping had taken me to the edge of what I assumed was the Crater Lake. The area around me had crumbling buildings, most still missing windows. The crater itself encompassed an extremely large area, stretching almost a dozen blocks. I could still see the remnants of buildings inside. I pulled out my Crafting Bench and quickly made and placed a chest, which I dumped everything but my bed inside of. The bed I placed next to the chest, and I right-clicked it. Luck be a lady, my avatar jumped into the bed and I entered the “naptime” animation, confirming my new spawn point.  
  
I left the bed and looked over the water. Here goes nothing.  
  
I took a few steps back, began sprinting, pressed the spacebar, and dove into the lake.  
  
The moment I was submerged, I started taking damage, shaking the screen. What was really odd was that it didn't seem to be actually affecting my hearts - they stayed at full. I quickly pressed ‘E’, trying to see what status effects (if any) I was suffering from, but nothing was listed. Luckily I started actually taking damage once I began drowning.  
  
I got my answer once I actually died. After only a few seconds in the water, the familiar “You died!” screen appeared, and I had the option to either respawn or return to the title screen. However, in the chat, the following message was displayed:

> hjtfir drowned whilst trying to escape BUTCHERISH  
> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> oh you stupid motherfucker  
> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> Please don’t be dead.  
> <Kid_Win> WHAT THE HELL  
> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> Don’t be dead. Come on.  
> <Kid_Win> WHAT THE HELL

Butcherish. Sort of Butcher? Who could that be? I stared at the red-tinted Game Over screen before clicking ‘respawn’. I reappeared right next to my bed and typed out a message.

> <hjtfir> I’m okay! See, it worked! I died and just respawned in the bed I placed outside the lake.  
> <Kid_Win> you CANNOT DO THAT AGAIN  
> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> Steve. You’re not my Ward yet, but holy shit try not to die? Please? We thought we’d lost you for a good thirty seconds or so.

They were overreacting. I _did_ tell them I would respawn, right?

> <hjtfir> But doesn’t this prove I can fight the Lost Garden or whatever? I can’t die.  
> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> Absolutely not. This has just shown me that you have horrible judgement. What possessed you to go into the Butcher’s lake?

So _that’s_ who killed me.

> <hjtfir> to be fair I totally forgot Cherish was being held there  
> <Kid_Win> It is exceptionally concerning that you even know that, let alone that you forgot, but I’m starting to side with Vista at this point.

Ugh. I broke the chest and began re-organizing my inventory. Tools on the bottom, useless pre-hardened Containment Foam in the top...  
  
On second thought, I threw the Containment Foam into the Lake. It’ll despawn after five minutes. Hassle-free matter destruction!  
  
I took the bed with me as I began to sprint. Then I stopped sprinting.

> <hjtfir> Where you at? I wanna get in on the action.  
> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> Not acceptable. Especially after your stunt just then.  
> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> You may be “invincible,” but if you don’t listen to direct orders you cannot be present on a battlefield. I hate to do this.

What the fuck, CB? Why single me out?  
  
I was about to type out a long, eloquent response that would have totally explained my perspective with absolute clarity of thought when I heard a loud crash from behind me. I whipped my head around, but all I could see was the bunker, same as it had been since the last time I got up from my chair.  
  
It took me a solid few seconds to realize the crash came from the surround sound system. Once I did, I moved the mouse around to see what had actually made the sound.  
  
It looked like Groot. No, it looked like the original incarnation of Groot. The one where he was essentially a giant wooden orc, with a huge, thick body. There were no leaves hanging off of this Ent. Instead, perched atop its shoulders and its head were three people in green robes. The robes were light-green, with a more verdant trim along the edges. The figure perched atop Not-Groot’s head had some sort of sniper rifle in his hand, trained on...  
  
On me. Oh, _shit_.  
  
I began to sprint jump away from the purple beam that the gun fired. It whizzed right past me, and I ran closer to the wooden golem. If I was really close to it, then he wouldn’t aim through it just to hurt me, right?  
  
As I got closer, the figure on the right shoulder stretched his arms out, and a haze began to form around his arms. Suddenly my field of view shrank. I tapped ‘E’ quickly. As I had suspected, this cape had somehow hit me with slowness.  
  
The sniper managed to hit me. I took eight hearts of damage.

> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> Steve you’re being really quiet  
> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> all good?

I _slowly_ ducked into a side street and typed out a quick answer.

> <hjtfir> lost garden groot here help  
> <Kid_Win> What?! Why are you anywhere near Thodue?

Good to know Kid Win recognized the OG Guardian. That wasn’t really helpful though, because “Thodue” was getting really close to me. Its stomps were getting _really loud_.  
  
Thodue was right on top of me. It bent down, lining up a perfect shot for the sniper. I couldn’t take any more damage, or I’d die. I couldn’t run away - the Slowness was too strong.  
  
From my perspective, I only had one option.  
  
I charged Thodue with my sword. The moment I left-clicked, something I didn’t expect happened. Thodue instantly straightened out, turned red, and flew about two meters backwards. His riders, on the other hand, fell right through the golem as if it was not there while it was stun-locked.  
  
_Did I do that?_ I wondered. As I watched, the sniper rifle guy fell with a hard _thud_ , and he didn’t look to be doing so great, judging by the lack of screaming. I wasn’t as lucky with Shoulders One and Two.  
  
Slowness Dude had managed to slow his own descent with his goddamn Feather Fall powers. Shoulder Two, on the other hand, did _something_ as he fell and was suddenly enveloped in a green light that made him fall with a soft _whumph_ when he hit the ground.

> <hjtfir> Lost garden are fucking cheaters who cheat  
> <Kid_Win> Steve!? Are you still near the lake?  
> <Kid_Win> Where are you?!  
> <hjtfir> near lake  
> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> Stay where you are. We’re on our way.

That was nice. Hopefully, I wouldn’t lose all of my stuff before they came.  
  
Slow-fall Guy finally landed and straightened himself out. He looked straight at me and held out his hands, and my field of view took a hit again. A quick check of my inventory confirmed I had suddenly received Slowness IV.  
  
Not good.  
  
“Block man!” said Two. Oh, that was me, apparently. “Tell the Undersiders that this is our city now! Thodue cannot be stopped, and Barrow will finish what we started!”  
  
I stood there, looking at him.  
  
“That shot from earlier nearly took off your arm,” groaned the sniper, pulling himself up. I was honestly shocked he wasn’t dead, let alone that he could talk. “Leaving you alive is a mercy that we can only grant if you spread the word of our future.” He slowly raised his rifle to line up with my head.  
  
I would _really_ have appreciated a Deus Ex Machina right about now.  
  
“What do you say?” That was Shoulder One, Slowness Guy. “I can keep you here forever. Yes or no?”  
  
I nodded very vigorously. Slowness Guy seemed vaguely offended that my head wasn’t affected, but he let me go anyway, and my field of view returned to normal. With this extended view, I could see that Shoulder Two had turned around to check on Thodue, who, despite being a giant tree monster, looked a little shaken from me having hit him. I guess being turned temporarily intangible and being thrown backwards while you turn a nice shade of red was a little disconcerting, especially if it means your riders get thrown off.  
  
The sniper still had his gun trained on me. I turned away from the duo and began to back off. While they couldn’t see me, I held down right-click and ate three cooked porkchops. As I watched, my health slowly climbed back to full.  
  
I would not die again today. I spent, like, a full hour getting the stuff in my inventory!  
  
Once my health was full, I began to sprint-jump away from Lost Garden. As soon as I rounded the corner of a street, I opened the chat.

> <hjtfir> Okay, I managed to get away. Lost Garden. Four capes plus Thodue?  
> <hjtfir> Slowness guy, Sniper Joe, and some green-aura dude  
> <Kid_Win> That sounds like Vale, Pike, and I don’t know who the last one is.  
> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> What did he look like?  
> <hjtfir> They all had the same robes  
> <hjtfir> Green aura guy was kind of indistinguishable aside from the power

As I continued down the street I remembered something.

> <hjtfir> They said something like, “halt, undersider, we own this city now, spread the word.”  
> <hjtfir> sounded a lil’ overconfident  
> <hjtfir> but that’s just me /shrug

I began to hear the rumble of a car engine and sirens. At least I hoped it was a car engine. I hadn’t seen many cars around as I explored this area. I guess most of them became unusable after Leviathan and Shatterbird.  
  
No, wait, I recognized the sirens. They were the same higher-pitched wail of the PRT that I had heard when I first met Vista and Assault. I began to sprint-jump in that direction.  
  
The PRT truck entered my field of view, and I had never been happier to see the colors green and white.  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
Waiting in the back of the truck were Clockblocker, Miss Militia, and a PRT trooper. Near where sat Clockblocker was the comm, the screen still on the chat log. Miss Militia was standing, holding on to a ring hanging from the truck’s ceiling.  
  
“What the hell were you thinking?” asked Clockblocker. Miss Militia gazed strangely at him through her bandanna but didn’t say anything.  
  
“You could have gotten killed, Steve. Actually, you _did_ get killed. You are so fucking lucky that you can come back. I mean--” Clockblocker obviously wanted to say more, but Miss Militia put up a hand to silence him. She looked at me, then Clockblocker, and even though I couldn’t see his face, Clockblocker looked a little ashamed. Miss Militia then faced me head-on.  
  
“Steve,” she began. “We cannot debrief now. Where did you last see Lost Garden?”  
  
I turned around and left clicked in the direction I came from. Miss Militia nodded and turned to Clock.  
  
“Clockblocker, come. You can play crowd control against Thodue.” The two began to leave the back of the truck, but I quickly typed out a message.

> <hjtfir> Wait!

The communicator read out my message. Clockblocker and Miss Militia turned around.  
  
“What is it, Steve?” asked Miss Militia.

> <hjtfir> Okay  
> <hjtfir> I’m sorry  
> <hjtfir> but this is important  
> <hjtfir> when I hit Thodue with my sword

“You did _what_?” interjected Miss Militia. I swapped my held object to my stone sword. I didn’t think I cut an especially imposing figure, but Clockblocker flinched. Guess he wasn’t used to how held items instantly swap models. As I continued typing, Miss Militia picked up Clockblocker’s communicator.

> <hjtfir> that sword.  
> <hjtfir> when I hit him with it, he reacted the same way as a living creature being hit would react in the game, and turned temporarily intangible  
> <hjtfir> and the people on top of him fell through. Pike and Veil and the other one?

“Vale with an ‘a’,” corrected Miss Militia, her eyes on the comm.

> <hjtfir> Vale, then  
> <hjtfir> doesn’t matter  
> <hjtfir> they aren’t doing so hot. I seem to have a very specific counter to Thodue.  
> <hjtfir> I can help if I come!

Miss Militia and Clockblocker exchanged glances. Then Clockblocker stepped forward.  
  
“Steve. Harold. You’ve found that your power works well against Thodue, but that’s not enough. You could end up distracting me or Miss Militia. You could die and re-appear in an inconvenient location. We don’t know enough about how you power works to send you in, and that’s not including the fact that you didn’t listen to me _when I tried to tell you not to drown yourself,_ ” finished Clockblocker.  
  
Well.  
  
When you put it that way, I sounded like a huge dick.

> <hjtfir> I’ll... see you at the HQ, then?

Clockblocker looked at me and nodded. “See you there,” he said.  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
[CURRENT INVENTORY](https://i.imgur.com/HHZRha5.png)  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AO3 note: The original Author's Note for this chapter is entirely about update rates for the fic. Since this is a port of the SB version and those notes no longer apply, I have neglected to include them. If you would like to see them, view the chapter on SB or SV, but you really aren't missing anything.


	6. Dream a Little Dream

The Wards HQ was much quieter than I had remembered it without Clockblocker there. Vista was still in her room, Crucible was on console, and Kid Win was patrolling. I noticed Crucible's comm was next to him and decided to make myself noticed.

> <hjtfir> Hey, Crucible. How are you today?

Crucible looked at his comm and turned around to eventually look at me.  
  
“Oh, Steve. Barely noticed you were here. You're kind of quiet, you know.”  
  
As an experiment, I had tried to mute footsteps in settings to see if I could become totally silent. Sort of success? Maybe?

> <hjtfir> Can you hear me when I move?

I began to run around the room. Crucible raised an eyebrow but nodded. Damn, that would have been so cool if it worked.  
  
“Why did you ask me that?” asked Crucible.

> <hjtfir> I'm still learning about my powers and thought I could become a ninja. Turns out I can't. :(

Crucible shook his head. Before he turned around completely, I quickly typed out a message.

> <hjtfir> You know, Crucible, ‘Cruce. Can I call you Cruce?

“No.”

> <hjtfir> Crucible. You know, I don't really know anything about you. Let's chat, let's get to know each other.

Crucible shrugged in his chair. “What is there to know? I'm Crucible, I make bubble forcefields, I'm training to be Wards Leader. Sometimes I play football.”  
  
That wasn't very much to go off of.  
  
I was going to make references to Pop Culture to see if he got them, but then I remembered: alternate Earth.  
  
There went half my comedy repertoire in one fell swoop.  
  
I tried to think of something funny to say to get his attention, but I heard a door opening from behind me. I turned my avatar around to see...  
  
Vista.  
  
It had only been a few hours since her blow-up, and she still didn't look too great. Her cheeks weren't lined with dried tears or anything, but she looked a little miserable, her shoulders hunched over and her face tilted towards the ground.  
  
I stepped towards her. She heard my decidedly-not-silent footsteps and looked up.  
  
“Whatever you're going to say, Harold, I don't want to hear it.”  
  
Good start.

> <hjtfir> I just wanted to say I didn't mean to minimize what you've gone through.  
>  <hjtfir> When I said that Taylor had gone through more suffering than anyone I didn't mean to make it seem like you weren't valid.

This was hard to type. Vista seemed to be ignoring what I was saying, but then again she hadn't moved away. She _did_ know that she could walk right through my avatar, right?  
  
Right.

> <hjtfir> For what it's worth, I'm really sorry.  
>  <hjtfir> Obviously this isn't a book. Earth Bet is real, the food I ate for breakfast was real, you're real, your problems are real.

Vista scoffed. So she _was_ paying attention. I could work with this.

> <hjtfir> I really want to work with you. More than that.  
>  <hjtfir> I want our time together on the Wards to be a positive one. Can you forgive me?

Vista kept looking off to the side, but she bit her lip.  
  
Then she shook her head. “Harold... I don't want to say I'm sorry for being upset, because you did upset me. It's just...”  
  
She made eye contact with my avatar. Through her visor, I could see her eyes were beginning to tear up. “I can't stand the fact that I can't hear your voice. It's so awful to hear someone try and apologize through a text-to-speech, and it's making it a lot harder to forgive you for just... minimizing me, and the rest of us, like you did!”

> <hjtfir> I'm so so so sorry. I didn't think before I spoke.

“No, I know that,” she said. “That part's obvious. I've been thinking about what you said for the past few hours. Was it just that you wanted to lord it over us, that you knew all these things? About me, about my world?”

> <hjtfir> If I'm being totally honest the answer is a little bit  
>  <hjtfir> but it doesn't change the facts that are out there.

Crucible, from his place on the console, whistled. “Not the response I think she was looking for, Steve.”  
  
Vista cocked her head. “Steve?”  
  
Crucible shrugged. “It's what he told me his name was when we first met.”

> <hjtfir> Stupid inside joke between me and myself. I'm probably going to change it.  
>  <hjtfir> but it's not important right now.

I turned to face Vista.

> <hjtfir> Vista, will you forgive me? At least to create a conducive work environment. If we're going to be teammates I would prefer if I “counted”.

Vista bit her lip again.  
  
“Can we just... agree to not talk about what you brought up the first time we spoke?” she asked. “Even though it's probably true, I still don't like it."

> <hjtfir> Absolutely. From now on, I'm just your average ordinary guy trapped in a bunker a few dimensions away.

Vista snorted a little.  
  
That was good.  
  
This could work.  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
When Clockblocker arrived back in the common room, he called everyone who was on base in for a debriefing about Lost Garden. After being dislodged from Thodue, summarized Clock, Pike and Vale were easily taken by my and Miss Militia's combined efforts. The third one, Fen, had been more difficult.  
  
“She has the power to imbue stuff with properties of plants. So when she fell off of Thodue, she probably made the pavement soft like a mushroom or something,” said Clockblocker. “She kept imbuing pebbles with bad juju.”  
  
“Juju?” asked Crucible, raising an eyebrow.  
  
“Sleep powder or poison. We don't know for sure, but a trooper who got hit still hasn't woken up.”  
  
Everyone bowed their heads for a moment. I did so too, moving the mouse down slightly.  
  
“But we did eventually manage to capture her, if only temporarily. She got away by making the back of the van pliable like a leaf, or something along those lines.”  
  
Crucible frowned but didn't say anything.  
  
“However, I did get word from above that Lost Garden is probably going to stay away from Brockton for a while, especially considering we got two of their capes. Which is good news!” finished Clockblocker.  
  
Vista was impassive. Crucible smiled, then noticed Vista, and stopped smiling. I probably looked indifferent to them, considering I was basically a couple of cardboard boxes stacked on top of each other with some bad pixel art painted on.  
  
Clockblocker then looked at me. “Now, Steve, you fought off Thodue and managed to dislodge the rest. Protocol states that in the event you are unable to give a hand-written account, you can give an interview. Is that acceptable?”  
  
Jesus, Clock sounded like a robot. I guess he was tired or something? I shrugged in the real world and scooted closer to the keyboard.

> <hjtfir> Sure, I'd love to.

Clock nodded and pulled out a small recorder device. “Begin interview, July 20th, 6:13 PM. Clockblocker and Ward member with the temporary cape name of 'Steve’. Steve has a communication disability, and everything he types will be read out via text-to-speech. Steve, what happened today, in your own words?”  
  
I took a moment to think, then began typing.

> <hjtfir> After a powers testing experiment at the Crater Lake, I was on my way back to the PRT HQ when I ran into the Lost Garden members Thodue, Vale, Pike, and Fen.  
>  <hjtfir> Three of them were perched atop Thodue. When, in a fit of desperation after being hit by Pike and trapped by Vale, I panicked and hit Thodue with my sword, Thodue temporarily turned red and intangible and flew backwards, much in the same manner as a Minecraft enemy.  
>  <hjtfir> The three capes atop Thodue fell through him. Vale slowed his descent with his power, Pike fell hard, but was okay, maybe because of his armor, and Fen did something with her power but landed softly.  
>  <hjtfir> They confused me for an Undersider and told me to warn the rest of the Undersiders that Lost Garden and Barrow specifically was coming.  
>  <hjtfir> I agreed to spread the word and contacted the PRT, who picked me up.

Clock looked at me. “You're leaving some details out, Steve. Why exactly were you at the Crater Lake?”  
  
Oh. So that's where he was going with this.

> <hjtfir> Like many other capes, I had an idea about my power that turned out in the end to be true. I thought that if I followed the mechanics of the video game my power operates identically to, I'd be able to unlock new potential for it.  
>  <hjtfir> In the game, death is only temporary. So I thought it might be the same with my power. It was.

Clock sighed. “Be more specific, Steve.”

> <hjtfir> I attempted to drown my avatar in the nearest body of water, Crater Lake, in order to test my theory. I placed all my items in a chest and slept in a bed. The only risk was loss of Experience Points.

Clock put a gloved hand to his face. “Remember to mention the death message, Steve.”  
  
I sighed in the real world. Clock was being a bit of a dick right now. Not a fan.

> <hjtfir> When I died, the message in the chat window was “hjtfir drowned while trying to escape BUTCHERISH.” Presumably this means the Butcher.  
>  <hjtfir> I admit, my plan was reckless, but it did work, and I learned about my power.

Clock groaned. “Steve, powers testing is only to be done in authorized PRT facilities, _especially_ experiments with high risk of death. To try to actively kill yourself, even if you thought you could come back? Totally unacceptable.”  
  
He shook his head. “If you don't learn how to listen to orders, you won't be able to be a part of this team. As my first official order to you, once you join the Wards, you are to have a week of console duty. End interview.” Clock turned off the recorder, then sat in the chair in the front of the room.  
  
“Alright, I'm going to be level with you guys right now. We have had an...” Clock looked at Vista and Crucible. “... _exceptionally_ stressful week. With Skitter, and Flechette, and now Steve literally dropping out of the sky, it's just been one thing after the other.  
  
“So this is me asking you - if I seem more of a hardass this week than before, I'm not trying to be a buzzkill, but it'll happen. I'm pretty miserable right now. Kicking Lost Garden's ass helped, but Steve over here didn't.” He looked at me for the last bit. Oof.  
  
“Just, please remember to do your best. Be kind to each other. Ugh, I sound like Dean right now.” I couldn't see behind his mask, but he sounded like he was smiling. Vista was smiling - a sad, wistful smile. “Let's be Wards together, okay? We're a team.”  
  
Crucible cheered. Didn't take him for a cheerer, but okay. Vista smiled and stood up to go into the hallway. I looked at Clock, and he nodded. The two of us left the room together.  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
That night, I officially signed on to be a Ward.  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
I logged out of Brockton Bay once I put my avatar in an empty room. Dinner was a more subdued affair than the prior night’s, with the Doormaker Dish simply giving me a bowl of chicken noodle soup. It reminded me of my grandmother, giving me a warm fuzzy feeling until I remembered she was literally several worlds away.  
  
Still didn’t stop the soup from tasting good as hell, though. That was some _fantastic_ broth. Where did they get this stuff, Israel in an alternate universe where everyone stopped fighting and instead just grew parsley?  
  
...not only did that joke not even make sense to me, but I hadn’t even said it out loud. Depressing.  
  
“I’m fucking hilarious,” I told the air.  
  
The air didn’t respond.  
  
Suddenly, as if the air was, in fact, responding, I felt a slight breeze pass my left shoulder. I stood up, dropping my spoon in my bowl. “Custodian? That you?”  
  
I stayed standing, looking around for any ghost-y activity. Nothing happened, and I sat back down.  
  
I resumed eating my soup, _suspiciously_.  
  
Dessert was the best fucking brownie I’ve ever had. Fuck Contessa for ruining all of the chocolate I’ve eaten in the past by comparison.  
  
I hadn’t yet had an opportunity to use the shower, so after “carefully folding my clothes” (read: tossing them into a corner) I stepped in. I looked sideways at the wall under the showerhead. It only had one big button in the middle. Curious, I pressed it.  
  
Water came pouring out of the showerhead, exactly the same temperature as the room. I could tell that was true because it didn’t feel at all as if I had stepped in anything at all, just that something was touching me. It was almost creepy until the water started gradually getting hotter.  
  
Oh, holy shit. Was this shower as personalized as the Doormaker Dishes?  
  
As it turned out, yes. The water slowly raised itself in temperature, going from mildly clammy to warm, then hot, then for a split second mildly scalding, then back to pleasantly hot. Steam filled the shower stall, and a vent at the top that I hadn’t noticed began to suck in the steam when it came in excess.  
  
Fucking perfection. Just like everything else in this bunker. I didn’t want to leave the shower, it was just so _nice_ to be in.  
  
Unfortunately, the shower seemed to sense my emotions or something, because the moment it detected I was super satisfied with everything it dropped a dollop of shampoo on my head from the center of the showerhead, ruining my meditation. I grumbled, but after rubbing it in and rinsing it off I was cleaner than I remembered feeling in recent memory. They must have put some menthol or something in the soap formula because I felt like my entire body had rinsed in mouthwash.  
  
Just pristine.  
  
After another few minutes of luxuriating, the water slowly shut off, replaced by hot air. A wooden bench slid out from the wall, and before I knew it I was sitting in a sauna.  
  
The future was here.  
  
I just leaned back against the bench and _breathed_.  
  
This was the life.  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
I was dreaming. Aliens had taken over the U.S. Government, and to prevent us from declaring war, they just moved the government buildings so nobody could find them to vote on a plan of action. Luckily, a bunch of dogs had triggered with superpowers and formed a sentai team, where they pretended to be human. I was just about to find out who the secret mastermind behind both the invasion and the team was before a loud, keening wail woke me up.  
  
At first, I thought it was the cry of a Ghast, and that overexposure to Minecraft had left me hallucinating. It had happened before. One time when I was a lot younger I had had a dream about Super Mario Galaxy for the Wii, and whenever I spun in my dream my wrist twitched in real life.  
  
The wail happened again, and I opened my eyes and sat up. The lights slowly came on when the sensor picked up my movement. I waited for a few seconds. The wail happened again, but this time, it didn’t stop.  
  
Slowly, I rubbed my eyes and got out of bed, following the sound in relation to the rest of the room.  
  
My poor echolocation skills led me past the bookshelves, past the television with the unfamiliar game systems, to... a blank wall?  
  
Something about the spot I heard the wailing coming from pinged something in my memory. I turned around. This was directly perpendicular to the computer, in line with where my chair was when I first woke up here.  
  
This spot was where Contessa had Doored out. I put my ear against the wall.  
  
The cries were still ongoing. They got louder, and louder, before suddenly stopping altogether.  
  
I went back to bed, but I didn’t go back to sleep.  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
[CURRENT INVENTORY](https://i.imgur.com/HHZRha5.png)  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AO3 Note: See last chapter's end note.


	7. A Whole New World

At about 7:30 the next morning, after a breakfast that didn’t need to be recorded here, I logged back into Brockton Bay. The door to the room my avatar had spent the night in was left open.  
  
Nice.  
  
I walked out to find all four of the other Wards chatting about something or other. I held down the ‘W’ key to join them. Clock was sitting on a table, one foot on the ground and the other on the table. Kid Win and Crucible were on a couch near the table. Vista was standing at the side of the couch, leaning a hand on the armrest. All of them only had domino masks on and were in casual wear. Presumably, some of them had stayed here overnight, and they were chatting before school.  
  
Vista was speaking. As I got closer, I was able to make it out. “...Heartbreaker won’t come here personally. I’ve looked up his past movements, something, some _one_ specific has to have caught his interest. Once he has it he’ll leave. He’s not a city-taking type.”  
  
Kid Win nodded. “Lost Garden is really more worrying because they’re interested in the Undersiders. Having us take two of their capes is good discouragement, but they still haven’t gotten that battle they want. If there’s one thing I know about villains, especially after dealing with Skitter, is that if they have a goal in mind and they don’t get it, they’re going to get antsy. And antsy is bad.”  
  
Clock smiled to himself for a moment and shook his head. Crucible noticed, and asked, “Wait, what did you just smile about?”  
  
“It’s dumb,” said Clockblocker. “I thought of a pun. Since you mentioned Skitter. Antsy villains? Skitter’s the antsiest of them all.”  
  
Vista snorted. “That was the most shameless pun I think I’ve heard from you in months, Clock.”  
  
In the real world, I was laughing too. That was so top notch.  
  
Clock shook his head. I could hear his smile through his mask. “Thanks. But I want to steer the conversation to the elephant in the room.”  
  
For a second, I thought he was going to talk about whatever the hell Cozen’s gang was called. But instead of beginning to speak about them, he turned around to face me.  
  
“Steve,” he said. “Harold. Now that you’re an official Ward, we need to revive an old tradition from my first days here.”  
  
Kid Win rubbed his hands dramatically and cackled. Vista grinned in a way that made me suspect she modeled it directly after Tattletale. Poor Crucible just looked confused.  
  
“We shall... _brainstorm cape names for you_ ,” announced Clockblocker.  
  
I heard a loud, booming thunder strike from somewhere. I quickly turned around, looking out the window, but the sky was clear. Then I turned to see Kid Win laughing while holding a remote.  
  
Did he just have that constantly rigged up or something?  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
“Okay. What about Block Man?”

> <hjtfir> Dumb, but accurate.

“Artificer?”

> <hjtfir> Not feeling it.

“Foundry?”

> <hjtfir> Did you just Google synonyms for crafting?

Kid Win looked up from the tablet. “Google? What’s that?”

> <hjtfir> Oh, god. Don’t tell me...

I walked over and looked at Kid Win’s tablet. For just a moment, I feared the absolute worst and expected to see the Bing logo headlining the page he was on. Instead, I saw...

> <hjtfir> Go.com?

“You don’t know about Go.com?” asked Vista.

> <hjtfir> Owned by Disney Go.com?

Now Vista looked really confused. “You mean the movie company? They’ve been out of business for years, what would they have to do with Go.com?”

> <hjtfir> Oh my God. Earth Bet really _is_ the darkest timeline.  
> <hjtfir> Does the phrase “The Little Mermaid” ting anything? Ring a bell?

The Wards looked at each other. “Do you mean the Hans Christian Andersen story?” Crucible offered.

> <hjtfir> Oh, so you know that but you don’t know about the Disney Renaissance era.

Clock shook his head, apologetically offering a half-smile. “Sorry. Alternate universe stuff?”

> <hjtfir> *sigh*. I mean... I guess.  
> <hjtfir> If I ever manage to find a way home I’m going to force you all to watch Aladdin with me.

Vista just looked at me. My blocky, two-by-one pixel eyes. It probably absolutely sucked to talk to me.  
  
Kid Win clapped his hands loudly, startling everyone (me included) and said, “Okay, back to the topic at hand. What about Blocksmaster?”  
  
Vista shook her head. “Even though we pretend Defiant is someone else, he’d probably think it would be a joke in poor taste.”  
  
Crucible suggested a name for the first time that discussion. “You said the game was made by someone called Notch. What if you name yourself that?”

> <hjtfir> Notch?  
> <hjtfir> It feels like treading on his grave, even if he never existed in Earth Bet.

Kid Win’s eyes widened. “Wait, is this guy dead?”  
  
Oh boy. At this moment I had a choice. I could either explain to them how Notch sold Minecraft to Microsoft in an attempt to get his life back, or...  


> <hjtfir> In my world, there’s an urban legend tied to Minecraft.  
> <hjtfir> Notch’s brother had died while he worked on the game. His username was “Herobrine.”  
> <hjtfir> One day, a player noticed another humanoid figure in their singleplayer world. Instead of the eyes with pupils like I have, this figure had all white eyes.  
> <hjtfir> Over the next few weeks, the player kept experiencing weird glitches and errors. The world crashing before something is accomplished.  
> <hjtfir> Pyramids of sand appearing in oceans. Random two by two tunnels cut into caves and walls. Time seemingly reverting and him losing progress.  
> <hjtfir> Beloved pets suddenly disappearing. The player theorized this was the fault of the humanoid figure.  
> <hjtfir> There’s one thing I didn’t mention about the figure. He looked like the default avatar in every way but the eyes, yes, but there’s one more difference.  
> <hjtfir> Floating above him was the nametag “Herobrine.”

The Wards were silent. Then Clockblocker broke the silence by saying, “That’s a pretty slick cape name. You should take it, Harold.”  
  
Kid Win was aghast. “Are you seriously going to ignore that whole story about dead brothers and video game ghosts?”  
  
Clock was silent for a moment. Then, with a perfectly straight face, he said, “I’ve never heard of such a dead brother. Are you sure you’re not hallucinating?”  
  
“What?” Kid looked at Vista. “Vista, you’re not gonna just let Clock get away with this.”  
  
Vista shook her head, sadly. “I’m sorry, what are you talking about?”  
  
“Wha-” Kid shook his head. “Okay, ha ha, very funny, but this won’t work on us. Right, Crucible?”  
  
“What’s working on who?” asked Crucible.  
  
Kid Win looked at Clockblocker, then me, then Vista, then Crucible, then at the comm resting on the nearby table. Then he scrolled up the log to make sure he did, in fact, read my half-remembered creepypasta. He looked around the room one last time.  
  
Then he pressed a button on the communicator and alarms started blaring. “ATTENTION, ALL IN ROOM WARDS HQ. YOU ARE TO SUBMIT TO 2 HOURS MINIMUM MASTER/STRANGER CONFINEMENT.”  
  
Everyone did different things at once. Vista started shouting, “It was just a joke!” Clock groaned loudly. Crucible grabbed his hands with his face and muttered something about regretting trying to be funny. Kid Win started to yell “I didn’t know, I didn’t know!”  
  
Me? I was laughing my ass off. Top fucking humor.  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
Two exceptionally boring hours later, I was finally released from preliminary M/S screening. The PRT guys seemed reasonably confident in my assertion that no masters could affect me (since I was in another dimension), but protocols were protocols. In the meantime, however, I had picked up a random book from the shelves, since I couldn’t quit the server to grind for materials (that would have gotten me fired from the Wards).  
  
I had picked Ernest Hemingway’s _The Sun Also Rises_. It was a book about empty people with empty lives trying and failing to find meaning in stuff like bullfighting and romance. The title came from a section of Ecclesiastes:  


One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh; but the earth abideth forever... The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to the place where he arose... The wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north; it whirleth about continually, and the wind returneth again according to his circuits.... All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again.

  
But that... wouldn’t be true anymore, would it? Earth Bet is a place where giant monsters can rip up islands and sink them, where, if nothing changed, if nobody stopped him, a golden man would _destroy_ the sea, and the wind, and the earth.  
  
Existentially, there would be no comfort in such a thought.  
  
I didn’t like it.  
  
The characters in the novel didn’t have any permanent values, any philosophy to guide themselves in life. If they did, it was only a temporary philosophy, to be discarded along with everything else.  
  
What did I have?  
  
I looked around my bunker. I had my bunker. That’s one thing. This wasn’t _home_ , but it could serve as one, temporarily.  
  
But that was a _thing_. It wasn’t a value or philosophy. The most valuable thing I owned, my knowledge of Worm’s events, was stolen from me before I even woke up.  
  
What did I have?  
  
I had the Wards. That was a start. I had, I hoped, _friendship_ with the Wards. A group roughly my age, with similar problems, even if they didn’t have quite the immediate severity as “my real body is in another dimension.”  
  
I had myself. Me. Harold Jenkins. There was only one of me in this whole multiverse, and I had to find some kind of comfort in that knowledge, that I was special in that way.  
  
Before waking up here, only, what, two, three days ago? Fuck. Feels like longer. Before waking up here I had lived my life by the philosophy that I was an extra in someone else’s feature-length film. Nobody cared about the extras, their eyes would slide right off them. So an extra can do anything they want. Dance as crazy as they wanted, sing as loud as they wanted, make as many jokes as they wanted. It wasn’t like anyone would remember after some time passed, anyway. And if someone did notice that the extra in the back of the scene was dabbing ferociously? Then that’s a bonus to the viewer.  
  
It stopped working the moment I signed up to the junior superhero team.  
  
Like Jake Barnes just said in the page I was on in _The Sun Also Rises_ , “It seemed like a fine philosophy. In five years, I thought, it will seem just as silly as all the other fine philosophies I've had.”  
  
As I continued down the page, I agreed with the next excerpt even more.  
  
“Perhaps that wasn't true, though. Perhaps as you went along you did learn something. I did not care what it was all about. All I wanted to know was how to live in it. Maybe if you found out how to live in it you learned from that what it was all about.”  
  
_Here’s to hoping I find out_ , I thought, as I heard the PA in the M/S room buzz back to life.  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
The Wards, Clockblocker excepted (he was going to New York to do a test-run with Weaver against the Adepts), were late to school. I, on the other hand, had a very brief meeting with the local PR head. He was on the pudgier side, with his button-down shirt far too tight on him. His forehead glistened with sweat, and his shirt had wet patches around the shoulder area. I hoped it was just the June heat that was making him so sweaty. He took one look at me and groaned.  
  
“Case 53?” he asked.  
  
I shook my head and placed the communicator on the ground in front of him.  
  
He picked it up and glanced at it, then at me.

> <hjtfir> Not a C53, but someone with unique circumstances.

The PR guy looked startled to hear a robotic voice come out of the speaker of the comm. He leaned into it and started to talk into the comm’s microphone, putting his mouth way too close to it.  
  
“So do you talk through this?”

> <hjtfir> Buddy, my ears are on my head. That mic isn’t on.

The robotic text-to-speech made the poor PR guy jump and drop the comm. It clattered to the floor.

> <hjtfir> Okay, that’s expensive and maybe broken. Do you have a Tinkertech replacement budget in your salary?

The PR guy stared at the small device that output my words, and then looked at me. It took him considerable effort, but he screwed up his face and spoke. “Now, listen here, you, you, parahuman. You came here to get my advice, and, and, and, I’m going to give it to you.”  
  
I held down shift and moved my head towards the floor to symbolize submission.

> <hjtfir> I’m sowwy. Please fowgive?

The PR guy stared at me incredulously, then turned around and walked over to a table, completely ignoring my totally heartfelt apology. What a dick.  
  
“Okay,” he began. “So these are all the pictures my boss was able to get. I sketched some, some, ideas about what we could do.”  
  
I walked over and looked at the table. It was covered in photographs of me, from that time I was lost in the PRT lobby to the very first day on the beach.  
  
“So, I was, was wondering. You look like you’re wearing jeans and a black shirt, but can, can you change it?” He turned to me, his eyes shifting back and forth between me and the door. “I know that my, my daughter plays those fashion games where, where you change the outfit of the dolls. Since the, the file I have says you have game powers.”

> <hjtfir> I used to be able to change my appearance. The game changed a little when I got powers, but I might be able to. Why?

The poor guy looked back towards the door, where the comm remained, reading out my words. He shook his head and began to waddle over to a cabinet.  
  
“I spent all night, last night, all of the night, working on these.” With a flourish that would have looked far more dramatic if the PR guy (whose name I still didn’t know) didn’t seem to be one sentence from me away from keeling over, the doors opened to reveal a set of papercraft models that instantly made me nostalgic for the early days of Minecraft.  
  
Some of the designs were far too complex, or too three-dimensional to be used. But some of them...

> <hjtfir> Where did you get that dwarf idea? The shirtless one with the red beard?

With wide eyes, the PR guy looked to me, then his model, then back to me. Then he swooped his gaze over to the model and walked very close to it as if looking at it in a new light.  
  
“I got the, the inspiration from Dwarf Fortress. He’s, he’s the main character, the logo of the game.”  
  
Dwarf Fortress? The text-based game? That was made in the late nineties, long after capes had started appearing. I wondered how it had changed from the game I knew.

> <hjtfir> I’m not aware of this game.  
> <hjtfir> What’s it about?

“Oh,” said the PR guy, blushing slightly, “it’s a phone game. It’s a Dig Dug clone, but it’s a lot of fun, especially with how you can spend the gems you get from the digging part into a slot machine minigame for new dwarves.”  
  
Holy shit.  
  
Dwarf Fortress is a shameless cash grab in this timeline. Also, their logo looks like Honeydew’s Minecraft skin from the Yogscast, but that was probably a coincidence.  
  
A world without the Disney Renaissance, Dwarf Fortress or the dollar bill? Earth Bet _really is_ the darkest timeline. I needed to fix this somehow. This would be my revolution. Dwarf Fortress wouldn’t cut it - I needed a more iconic look.

> <hjtfir> What about that one back there?

The PR guy glanced at the general direction my eyes peered. He looked at me, then at his shelf. I crouched and began slowly walking towards the papercraft figurine I wanted to bring to his attention.

> <hjtfir> What about this one?

The poor PRT guy seemed to have given up understanding what I meant because he stuck a shaky finger in between my blocky eyes and traced its path down to the figure I was referring to. He picked it up and stared at it.  
  
“That’s, that’s Captain Marvel. I made this one just for fun, based on a, a comic character I liked when I was little. Only one I really read.”

> <hjtfir> Who made the comics?

The PR guy put a hand behind his head. “Uh, DC used to publish it? I think? But they’ve been out of business now, for, for a long time. Most of the big, uh, superhero comic books really went out of fashion.”

> <hjtfir> No, I knew that. I was just asking if the copyright on him still existed.  
> <hjtfir> I might want to take that design.

The PR guy put a hand to his mouth and gasped. “You absolutely cannot make a costume that derivative. No way. Uh-uh.”

> <hjtfir> But it’d be pixelated. Nobody would know.  
> <hjtfir> It’s not that derivative. If you’re about to tell me I can’t do that then every Tinker ever would be rejected from copying Iron Man or Lex Luthor.

The PR guy shook his head. “It doesn’t matter, anyway. I, I heard that you had thought of a name, and depending on it it might change everything I would have planned.”

> <hjtfir> Oh, that.  
> <hjtfir> I talked it over with the Wards this morning. Based on an urban legend where I come from.  
> <hjtfir> “Herobrine”. How do you like it?

The PR guy took a handkerchief out of his breast pocket and wiped his forehead with it. After he was done he stared at the sweat-soaked rag, mumbled under his breath, and threw it into the nearby trashcan.  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
[CURRENT INVENTORY](https://i.imgur.com/HHZRha5.png)  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AO3 Note: See the end note from two chapters ago.


	8. Hard Times

As it turns out, perhaps unsurprisingly, it was very boring to be a Ward under official punishment.  
  
Due perhaps mostly to my unique set of circumstances, much of my time was spent in the chair watching Vista patrol with Clockblocker. That was, the chair was metaphorical. I was actually sitting in a real chair, in the real world, but my avatar was basically just staring at the set of monitors I had seen when I first met Vista.  
  
Thanks to my limited handiness in Brockton I wasn’t _really_ able to help out on the hotline, either. In case of emergency, a PRT employee had temporarily received the same comm that Clockblocker had used just the day before. I was to send a message to them so they could transfer a call or something. Inefficient, but it sort of worked? It didn’t really matter, because Assault was in the next room over, stewing over the same feed.  
  
Assault _really_ didn’t look too good when I had seen him. Not sick, or haggardly, or anything. Just... angry. And slightly disheveled. Kid Win had given him a comm right before running out for school, and Assault had just stared at it for a moment.  
  
I used /msg and sent him a command.  


> _You whisper to kERTDYtZeVrfqFUbKSwL: anything going on?_

There was a pause. Now that I had thought about it, did anyone teach Assault how to actually _use_ the comm?  


> <kERTDYtZeVrfqFUbKSwL> Not much. Why do you ask?

Ah, shit.  


> _You whisper to kERTDYtZeVrfqFUbKSwL: You just posted that in public chat. To message me, type /msg hjtfir and then your message.  
>  You whisper to kERTDYtZeVrfqFUbKSwL: Everyone with a comm, which is really just Kid Win, the Wards trainer guy and me, saw your message._  
> <hjtfir> For those seeing this, ignore the above message.

That should settle it. I leaned back in my chair and turned the page. Jake Barnes had just introduced Brett Ashley to Pedro Romero, and that was, to quote Sonic the Hedgehog, a decision that was “no good.”  
  
Dammit, Brett. Always ruining everything.  


> _kERTDYtZeVrfqFUbKSwL whispers to you: Did this work?  
>  You whisper to kERTDYtZeVrfqFUbKSwL: Yeah.  
> You whisper to kERTDYtZeVrfqFUbKSwL: Only asked b/c I can only see KW’s feed and nobody else. A little boring._

Pedro and Brett had struck up a conversation. It was like watching a train wreck in slow motion. I turned the page.  


> _kERTDYtZeVrfqFUbKSwL whispers to you: Adamant is out with Dovetail. Not sure I can say anything more._

That was a little inconvenient, but I could deal. Protocol was protocol. I returned my eyes to the book in my hands.  
  
Pedro had just declared to Brett he was going to live forever. That was, Pedro Romero, the professional bullfighter.  
  
Maybe I was throwing stones, living in a glass house myself as a professional junior superhero, but that was probably not the best tactic for a long life, no matter how good you are.  
  
I turned the page.  
  
It was another few minutes before I got any new notifications.  


> <Kid_Win> Anything happening?

I quickly began typing out a response.  


> <hjtfir> Why do you ask? Is there anything on your end that needs addressing?  
> <Kid_Win> No, I was just asking.

Of course he was.  
  
I sighed. This was going nowhere. They could handle it if I went AFK for a few minutes, right?  


> <hjtfir> I’m going to take a quick break away from the keyboard. Be right back.  
> <Kid_Win> Okay  
> <kERTDYtZeVrfqFUbKSwL> Sounds good.  
> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> That should be fine, Herobrine. Take a break, we’ll cover for you. -Agent Johnson

What a good guy, that Agent Johnson. That was the first time someone had actually referred to me as “Herobrine,” and it definitely made me feel feelings. I still wasn’t sure if they were good feelings or bad feelings yet, but they were feelings.  
  
On one hand, receiving a real cape name and getting referred to by it meant things were really, well, real. I had signed myself up to be a junior superhero, and I had a name now. People could google “Herobrine” and soon enough I would come up.  
  
On the other hand, naming myself “Herobrine” was on par with “Coldsteel the Hedgeheg.” But both references were moot in an alternate universe where both source games didn’t exist. For all I knew, an assassin named Coldsteel actually had the power to teleport behind you. Earth Bet was just that weird.  
  
I scooted out of my chair and stood up. Stretching my back, I looked around the room. What to do, what to do?  
  
There were the games. The unfamiliar consoles had caught my interest on my first day in the bunker. But I didn’t think I would play them just yet. I personally had always had a bit of a steep learning curve when it came to picking up and using a new controller type, and the one attached to the console was... well, it was from an alternate dimension.  
  
I moved on. Books. There were some quality titles I recognized from before 1982. I also recognized the Maggie Holt series, but I had intentionally avoided picking it up earlier today. I was reading The Sun Also Rises, but I had been sedentary the whole time while reading it. Wasn’t there anything more active to do?  
  
I was restless.  
  
I was anxious.  
  
“Contessa, or Custodian, or whoever,” I said to the open air. “This would be a wonderful time to Deus Ex Machina some shit to fix whatever I’m feeling right now.”  
  
No answer came. If I hadn’t imagined Custodian last night, she certainly wasn’t here now.  
  
I kept scanning the room, seeing if anything caught my interest. In the puzzle and board game shelves sat a copy of “CLUE: Maggie Holt Edition.” That was pretty neat. I walked over to see what other fun things I could find. There were games I had never heard of, like something called “Penguin News,” and others I realized logically speaking should exist, like “Monopoly: Special Protectorate Edition” featuring a very bad-ass Hero, Alexandria, Eidolon, and Legend floating in the air facing a little boy who had dropped his ice-cream cone in shock and awe. Cute.  
  
The absences on the shelves depressed me. No Harry Potter. No Pokémon. There were things branded with the Nintendo Logo, but Mario looked very different, his colors inverted (blue on red) instead of what I was used to (red on blue). On many of the boxes for Nintendo-branded puzzles and board games he appeared in a circle, giving a Vault-Boy like thumbs up and smile above the words “Nintendo Seal of Quality.”  
  
It unsettled me to see Mario showing teeth like that. I shuddered involuntarily.  
  
I kept moving around the room. I had tried out the shower, slept in the bed, and somehow despite being in the same clothes as yesterday I still didn’t feel gross in them. Tinkertech fabrics, presumably.  
  
That still left me with the considerable problem of _what to do_?  
  
Then the refrigerator caught my eye.  
  
I ran up to it and threw open the door. The rows of Doormaker Dishes stared back, and I picked one at random. I sprinted over to the table, practically tripping over it, and pressed the button.  
  
Out of the square portal fell two pieces of bread, some butter, and a small bowl of shredded cheese. Each was in a little serving-size container, separate from the other ingredients.  
  
So _that_ was the game. They were going to have me Blue Apron up some of my own meals because I was taking what they were giving me for granted. Well, that wouldn’t work on me! I am a grilled cheese master! One time in the seventh grade, a teacher of mine stopped the class for ten minutes to explain his grilled cheese recipe, and now he travels across the country running a food truck! So I would say I was pretty qualified to do this!  
  
I turned to the kitchen. Fully stocked. Pots and pans. I was going to make a grilled cheese in the pan, and it was going to be amazing.  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
It was not amazing.  
  
To be honest, it had started out pretty promising. I found a pan I wanted to use pretty easily, and it fit on the gas stove. From there, I found a plate and put the bread on it. The next step was to butter the bread. Simple.  
  
That was where the problems began.  
  
Despite searching through all of the drawers for what felt like at least ten minutes, I could not find a single knife anywhere. Not one!  
  
I had found the ever-important spatula, forks, spoons, sporks, chopsticks, a few shot glasses, a pizza cutter, an ice-cream scoop, even a Kiddush cup, but not a single knife anywhere.  
  
It wasn’t really an important part of the lasagna experience, since it was so soft (and _perfect_ ) that I could have cut through it with the side of my fork, but I vaguely remembered a knife dropping out of the portal, so I kept looking for that one.  
  
Come to think of it, where _did_ the waste I had after meals go?  
  
After shaking my head and teaching the air a few curse words, I decided to use the end of a spoon to spread the butter on the bread. Both sides of both slices now had the fat of miracles on them.  
  
I located the knobs on the stove and turned one to ‘HI’, clicking it down to ignite the flames. It _fwooshed_ up and would have scorched the ceiling had I not turned it way the fuck down to ‘LO’ the instant the flames came out bright orange instead of a lighter blue.  
  
Jesus. Why did Cauldron even need a stove this powerful?  
  
On second thought, I didn’t want to know. I placed the pan on the stove, adding in the last of the butter. Then I scooped the to-be toast into the pan, hearing that delightful _fzzz_ as it began to sizzle. I added in the second slice, too.  
  
After some time, I flipped both over and sprinkled the cheese onto them. Then I stared at the two pieces of toast, one side cooked and the other cooking, each with a small mound of cheese, and muttered to myself, “what next?”  
  
I stared at the pan, hearing the sizzle. I felt the heat of the stove on my face, the spatula in my hand. Was this what Spongebob felt like in that episode he forgot how to make Krabby Patties? Just stared at the grill, wondering what life had come to?  
  
“Fuck it,” I muttered. I took the spatula and shoved it under one of the slices. Then I flipped it onto the other one.  
  
Unfortunately, I did not have the grace nor the dexterity to make it so that this simple gesture wasn’t a horrible disaster that ruined the pan forever by having half of the shredded cheese land on it directly, burning instantly and becoming stuck to it despite my efforts with steel wool.  
  
All in all, my adventure lasted about twenty minutes, at which point I used another Doormaker Dish and I got a beautiful, hot restaurant-style grilled cheese on a plate appear through the portal.  
  
Yeah, yeah. I got the message.  
  
Don’t try anything, idiot. You’d mess it up.  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
I sat back down and asked in the chat if I had missed anything. The chat instantly exploded.  


> <kERTDYtZeVrfqFUbKSwL> Herobrine? You were gone for well over half an hour! Where were you?  
> <Kid_Win> Herobrine! Is everything alright?  
> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> I’m going to take *my* break now, if you guys are okay with it. --Agent Johnson.

Fucking peak, Agent.  


> <hjtfir> Yeah. Just took a lunch break on my end. Feeling a little cabin fever.  
> <kERTDYtZeVrfqFUbKSwL> I can understand that, Herobrine, but you need to let us know. Half an hour is not “a quick break, be right back.”  
> <hjtfir> Okay  
> <hjtfir> I get that  
> <hjtfir> It kind of happened? I didn’t mean to spend half an hour away, lunch ran long  
> <Kid_Win> Man, you can’t just say that. You have to let someone know.

I sighed. I felt bad, now. It had just slipped my mind again. Something about the idea of typing out a message in Minecraft to the people who essentially employed me (I couldn’t exactly spend the money I would presumably earn) felt wrong.  


> <hjtfir> Okay.  
> <Kid_Win> That’s it?  
> <hjtfir> I’m *sorry*. Better?  
> <Kid_Win> I don’t know. You have to let Mr. Williams know.  
> <hjtfir> Mr Williams?  
>   
> Kid Win didn’t respond. Instead, I received Agent Johnson’s message first.  
>  _  
> LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj whispers to you: Harold, scroll up in the chat log._

I raised an eyebrow, but I didn’t send anything snarky back. There I found the following messages:  


> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> Herobrine, Mr. Williams from the PR department would like to follow up on yesterday’s meeting.  
> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> He has proposed, as a benefit to the school group from Middleton that is coming to visit, that you read the children a story.  
> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> This event will take place today at 2:00 PM.  
> <LlDNbRMm7rUNiazswdjj> Please respond as soon as you can. Thanks, Agent Johnson.

Oh.  
  
So that was what I had to do, apparently.  
  
No problem. I was great with kids. My charm and charisma (and bullshit) usually wowed them into submission. Plus, I was a camp counselor for a time, and I knew a lot of games I could play with them.  
  
I held down the ‘W’ key and was halfway through the room before I realized the problem.  
  
I couldn’t talk. I couldn’t even _gesture_. This was probably going to look really, really bad.  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
[CURRENT INVENTORY](https://i.imgur.com/HHZRha5.png)  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: The grilled cheese story is based on true events. I may be a fanfic writer of (*cough*) """high esteem,""" but a chef I most certainly am not.
> 
> Comments are, as always, appreciated.


	9. Storytime! (NOT CLICKBAIT)

To Clarence Williams, temporary PR head for the PRT ENE, Herobrine's storytelling performance for Middleton Elementary's visiting school children looked very bad indeed.  
  
Hand covering two-thirds of his face, Clarence peeked through his fingers just to make sure that what he was seeing was, in fact, happening.  
  
“That’s not my superhero,” droned the monotone voice of Kid Win’s comm. “His cape is too fluffy. So, now, whoever has the book, you can feel the cape, and see that it is, in fact, very fluffy. There you go.”  
  
The blocky figure of Herobrine stood there, sentinel-like, staring over the kids. Sure, he made an effort. When the text was being read, he nodded, as if talking. He’d walk back and forth, and gesture vaguely in the direction of the child holding the story. The only issue?  
  
The kids did not like it. Not at all.  
  
One kid burst into tears as Herobrine looked at him.  
  
Over the years, as Clarence had risen through the ranks, he’d heard about all sorts of different plans to make capes more accepted in society. For the normal, human capes, these plans had worked wonders. The last organized general anti-cape group disbanded in 2006, a little after Cornea had died. But the Case 53 efforts had been more... slow-going.  
  
Weld was a win, though. Was being the operative word, because after _something_ happened downtown (Clarence was away visiting his cousin in Philadelphia at the time), he and a lot of others of his kind had left the Protectorate, taking decades of progress with him.  
  
When he’d received news of Herobrine joining the Wards, Clarence was genuinely excited about a new cape for the first time in years. The retro aesthetic, if a little childish, had infinite potential. Why the parahuman had decided to dress in what looked to him in the photos as cardboard boxes, he didn’t know, but capes were by definition an odd bunch.  
  
Then when Herobrine had walked into his office and it turned out he literally was a series of floating colored cuboids, all of Clarence’s dreams had been thrown away with his sweat-covered handkerchief.  
  
Herobrine wasn’t a new hero with a cool sense of style. He was an annoying idiot with a dumb sense of humor who had signed up for the Wards because they gave him a free voicebox.  
  
So, Clarence had decided to schedule him for this PR event. Was it petty? Yes. But he also did legitimately want to see how Herobrine would react to being faced with a crowd. In some ways, children were both easier and harder to deal with than a press conference.  
  
“ That’s not my superhero,” continued Herobrine. “Her helmet is too shiny. Ooh, try not to get blinded, kiddos. That’s a bonafide LED in there.”  
  
Clarence had figured out pretty quickly Herobrine tended on the “bad with kids” side of things.  
  
As Clarence tried not to visibly facepalm too hard, the security guard next to him elbowed him.  
  
“Hey,” said the guard.  
  
Clarence glanced at the guard’s breastplate. Trooper Anderson nudged Clarence again.  
  
“Hey,” said Anderson. “I made something.”  
  
He had pulled out a smartphone while he nudged Clarence. Anderson navigated to the gallery app and scrolled down to the most recent image. Tapping on it, he turned his phone sideways, and the image filled the screen.  
  
It was an image of Herobrine with the kids. He stood over them, looking like more like a cardboard statue than a superhero. The kids were visibly upset. The caption was written on the split between the bottom and the top:  
  
“THIS JUST IN: KIDS DON’T LIKE PLAYING WITH BLOCKS ANYMORE”  
  
“BOTTOM TEXT”  
  
Clarence was less than excited by the meme.  
  
“You, you should probably delete that,” he whispered.  
  
“What?” said Anderson. “Why?”  
  
Clarence took a moment to formulate a response. “As the man currently in charge of the Brockton PR department, I am telling you you should delete that. It’s detrimental to the whole operation we’re doing here.”  
  
Anderson looked at his phone and blinked. Then he started cursing violently under his breath.  
  
“Sometimes I really hate my judgement,” he said. Clarence narrowed his eyes.  
  
“What did you do, Trooper?”  
  
The trooper glanced at his phone, then at Clarence, then back at his phone. “Promise you won’t fire me,” he said, eyes focused on his phone.  
  
“I can’t, can’t promise that. Can’t promise that,” responded Clarence.  
  
“ _Fuck_.” Trooper Anderson took a breath. “I might. _Might_ have put it on PHO?”  
  
It took Clarence several seconds to stop himself from strangling Anderson. This _nobody_ thought he could fuck up _his project_ and get away with it?  
  
He needed to play damage control. Damage control, quick. Control the damage!.  
  
“Where did you put it?” asked Clarence.  
  
“Uh, PHO Main?” said Anderson. Clarence swore. That was the most trafficked section.  
  
“Subforum?” asked Clarence.  
  
“Humor, I think.”  
  
“What account did you post it on?”  
  
“Not my Verified PRT one.”  
  
Clarence breathed a little. Okay. “Okay. Okay, that’s fine. We can spin it so that someone else, a, a teacher or someone posted it.” This was salvageable, but it wasn’t great.  
  
Trooper Anderson relaxed visibly. “Does this mean I’m not getting fired?” he asked, smiling weakly at Clarence.  
  
“No, you are absolutely getting fired.”  
  
“Fuck.”  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
As Clarence checked his phone a few minutes later, he was pleased to note that reception was actually mostly positive to the meme. People seemed eager for any news about the cape who fell from the sky, and seeing that he was hanging out with a group of elementary-school kids had raised a minor fervor on PHO of people clamoring to see the new Ward.  
  
Some of the comments worried Clarence, though:  


**►Thor4269**  
Replied On Jun 21st 2011:  
We sure that’s not a cardboard cutout becuase that looks like a carboard cutout

 

**►exes4eyes**  
Replied On Jun 21st 2011:  
Forget cardboard, what the fuck is on his shirt? Looks like someone vomited square-shaped bodily fluids on it. Jesus.

  
Not for the first time, Clarence was very happy Herobrine couldn’t use the internet.  
  
But there was some good points being raised. People asking if this was the new Ward, if this lined up with the rumors of someone fighting Lost Garden. Using a series of dummy accounts, Clarence shifted the conversation towards positive speculation, like the parahuman’s potential powerset and Wards reveal date.  
  
As he did his job, Clarence began to consider what some people were saying. They wanted to see Herobrine. Was that a good idea? They already knew what he looked like, but he was still officially on punishment duty.  
  
Clarence thought about it.  
  
On one hand, Herobrine basically wasn’t _doing_ anything. He couldn’t actually man the console when he didn’t actually have hands. Piggot would have called it a “waste of resources.”  
  
On the other hand...  
  
“ Kiddos and gamer girls, we’re just about wrapping this up now, so I just want, like, a general consensus. Do you actually, like, enjoy this kind of style of reading? Because I’m looking around and you don’t seem to be that engaged.”  
  
There was a pause.  
  
“Like, at all.”  
  
Dead silence. Even the teachers looked a little shocked at the Ward’s words.  
  
Then one kid broke the silence, shouting, “You’re scary!”  
  
After that, the floodgates opened. Kids were screaming, a few stood up and tried to start running around, teachers were frantically trying to wrangle their kids, and somehow Herobrine looked hopelessly, hopelessly lost. He walked over to Clarence.  
  
“Did I fuck up?” he asked. Unfortunately, he seemed to have forgotten that his voice wasn’t actually attached to his body, and the vulgarity was broadcast at maximum volume from the speaker sitting near where he had been reading.  
  
About half of the kids started giggling. “He said a bad wo-ord!”  
  
Clarence looked at Herobrine. “Please don’t say anything else. This situation is pretty bad right now.”  
  
Herobrine’s dead, pixelated eyes stared back at him.  
  
Then he nodded, and Clarence relaxed a little bit. “Okay. Meet me in my office in an hour, for now, just, just go.”  
  
Herobrine looked at the kids, and then at Clarence, and sprint-jumped away.  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
At around 4PM, Herobrine entered Clarence’s office.  
  
“You, you left your comm in the room with the kids,” said Clarence.  
  
“I realized that,” said the device on Clarence’s desk.  
  
“You didn’t go back for it,” said Clarence, looking at the Ward’s pixelated face.  
  
“I didn’t.”  
  
Clarence tried to stare down Herobrine, but he couldn’t find the energy to do so. He sighed.  
  
“Sit down, if you’re able to,” he said, gesturing to a chair.  
  
Herobrine walked over and did that weird squatting thing he did.  
  
“I'm going to start by saying that this, this was a disaster, and it's mostly your fault.”  
  
There was a moment as Herobrine processed this.  
  
“Okay,” responded Herobrine. “That's understandable.”  
  
Somehow this wasn't what Clarence expected to hear. He blinked at Herobrine.  
  
“No snarky remark?” asked Clarence. “No, no witticism?”  
  
A pause. Then:  
  
“No. But you get an apology.”  
  
Clarence gestured for him to continue.  
  
“I’m sorry. I don’t know why I tried to read the book in the way I did. It didn’t work, and I blame my communication problems and myself.”  
  
Herobrine paused for a few seconds.  
  
“It was absolutely my fault for swearing. I had a severe and continual lapse in judgement, and I don’t expect to be forgiven. I’m just here to apologize.”  
  
Clarence sighed. “Herobrine, I don’t know how able you are to browse the internet. But one of our troopers, who has since been discharged, made an image macro mocking you, and posted it online.”  
  
“So I heard,” said Herobrine.  
  
Clarence continued speaking. “It, it went viral in cape enthusiast circles, and people online have been, been clamoring for your public reveal. Now, I’ve given, given it some thought, and I believe I have a solution that both satisfies the conditions of your punishment and allows for the public to get a glimpse of you in action.”  
  
He paused. Herobrine didn’t seem to move, excepting that weird thing he did with his arms going slightly out to the sides and slightly back in.  
  
“I am offering you an opportunity to build whatever you want in the area near where the rig was.”  
  
Herobrine still didn’t move. Clarence’s eyebrow twitched. “Herobrine, I said--” he began, but was interrupted by the text-to-speech device.  
  
“Mr. Williams, I would be honored to build something in that location,” it buzzed. “When can I start?”  
  
Clarence Williams took a deep breath. “Tomorrow,” he exhaled. “Don’t fuck it up.”  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------  
  
  
  
\-----------------------------------------------------

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was the longest I’ve ever spent on a single chapter. This chapter was really experimental, in a number of ways. It has an alternate PoV for the first time, it has an OC in a starring role for the entire chapter length, and it has PHO interspersed, rather than an entire section. I also play with fonts for the first time in this fic. Don’t worry, it’s not permanent. The only reason it’s there at all is because I want to show clearly that Herobrine’s voice sounds extremely different, and Clarence obviously can’t see Herobrine’s chat logs when he’s standing at the opposite end of a room.
> 
> We’re nearing the endgame. Only six or so chapters to go!
> 
> For those of you who want more “Minecraft-y” action, that is the next chapter. Do not worry! Mining and crafting will occur.
> 
> Also, try and spot the Logan Paul reference.
> 
> Also also special thanks to Akallas von Aerok for helping with grammer and spulling, as well as word choice here and there. A few others helped out with minor things for this chap, and if you want to be credited, DM me on Discord.
> 
> Also also also, huge huge thanks to theonewhowas for helping me with the concept for this chapter months ago. If you haven't read her fic HOTSWAP yet, it's complete! One of the modern Wormfic classics.
> 
> As always, thanks for reading, and be absolutely sure to leave a comment! I read every last one of them :D


End file.
